http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/buzz/digitisation/ Recent content in Digitisation on Ariadne Hugo -- gohugo.io en-gb Fri, 13 Feb 2015 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/73/henshaw-et-al/ Fri, 13 Feb 2015 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/73/henshaw-et-al/ Overview of the UK Medical Heritage Library ProjectThe aim of the UK Medical Heritage Library (UK-MHL) Project is to provide free access to a wealth of medical history and related books from UK research libraries. There are already over 50,000 books and journal issues in the Medical Heritage Library drawn from North American research libraries. The UK-MHL Project will expand this collection considerably by digitising a further 15 million pages for inclusion in the collection. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/73/maclellan-rvw/ Fri, 13 Feb 2015 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/73/maclellan-rvw/ Collection development is a key skill taught in library schools around the world, it represents one of the business as usual elements in most librarians' roles, certainly in any I have undertaken. Getting your collection development right is a skill that takes lots of practice: like knowing which items to add to enhance your library stock; and which ones to remove to ensure that breadth of collection is not damaged; whilst making the collection inviting and easy to navigate. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/73/editorial/ Fri, 13 Feb 2015 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/73/editorial/ The requirement to make a business case to maintain or establish a service or a project is a familiar process for many of us working in Libraries.  Many libraries are asked to justify their very existence on a regular basis.  Some succeed, others unfortunately do not. We all seem to be doing more with less, and 'lean' is how we normally describe our staffing level. 14 months ago we made a case to top level University administration for an initiative around citations improvement, seeking funds for investment in a service to improve publication performance and citations analysis. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/72/ball-fowler/ Wed, 26 Mar 2014 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/72/ball-fowler/ The Hartley Library at the University of Southampton has in excess of 15,000 bound PhD and MPhil theses on 340 linear metres of shelving. Consultation of the hard-copy version is now restricted to readers making a personal visit to the Library, as no further microfiche copies are being produced by the British Library and no master copies of theses are lent from the Library. Retrieval of theses from storage for readers and their subsequent return requires effort from a large number of staff. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/72/editorial/ Wed, 26 Mar 2014 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/72/editorial/ Change Is the Only ConstantIssue 72 is the product of a long period of almost constant change. In the last issue, Richard Waller waved adieu as the outgoing editor, explaining the circumstances around the change in the Editorial for Issue 71 [1]. Richard has left some very large shoes to fill in terms of the quality of articles and the guidance for authors in producing readable and relevant material.  The change is apparent when we look at the context in which Ariadne is now operating: the University of Bath Library has taken the reins, well aware of the regard in which the publication is held by its readers - a wide community with the unifying theme of information use, management and dissemination at its heart. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/72/liu-adie/ Wed, 26 Mar 2014 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/72/liu-adie/ The concept of alternative metrics as indicators of non-traditional forms of research impact – better known as ‘altmetrics’ – has been gaining significant attention and support from both the scholarly publishing and academic communities. After being adopted by many publishing platforms and institutional repositories within the past year, altmetrics have entered into the scholarly mainstream, emerging as a relevant topic for academic consideration amidst mounting opposition to misuse of the Journal Impact Factor. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/72/ozono-et-al/ Wed, 26 Mar 2014 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/72/ozono-et-al/ The ShaRe Project (Shared Repository Project 2008-2009), which aimed to promote the concept of consortial repositories and facilitate their implementation, has made a significant contribution to the rapid growth of institutional repositories (IRs) in Japan. Following precedents including White Rose Research Online (UK) and SHERPA-LEAP (UK), 14 regional consortial repositories have been set up on a prefectoral basis across Japan*. Their success is demonstrated by the fact that as many as 92 bodies have set up IRs despite having no institutional hardware of their own. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/editorial2/ Tue, 16 Jul 2013 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/editorial2/ As I depart this chair after the preparation of what I thought would be the last issue of Ariadne [1], I make no apology for the fact that I did my best to include as much material  to her ‘swan song’ as possible. With the instruction to produce only one more issue this year, I felt it was important to publish as much of the content in the pipeline as I could. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/tsuchide-et-al/ Mon, 15 Jul 2013 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/tsuchide-et-al/ In Japan, Chiba University established the country's first institutional repository, CURATOR [1] in 2003. Since then, over the last 10 years or so, more than 300 universities and research institutions have set up repositories and the number of full-text items on repositories has exceeded one million [2]. All the contents are available on Japanese Institutional Repositories Online (JAIRO) [3] operated by the National Institute of Informatics (NII) [4] in Japan. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/skilton-et-al/ Mon, 08 Jul 2013 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/skilton-et-al/  Augmented reality, a capability that has been around for decades, is shifting from what was once seen as a gimmick to a bona fide game-changer. [1] Augmented Reality (AR) has been listed in the Horizon Reports, key predictors of the potential impact of new technology on education. The 2011 Report [1] sparked the idea for an innovative project - SCARLET: Special Collections using Augmented Reality to Enhance Learning and Teaching. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/rafiq-rvw/ Mon, 08 Jul 2013 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/rafiq-rvw/ The Information Society offers a detailed discussion on the concept and dynamics of the information society from a historical perspective to the present era of information societies. The book offers in-depth discussion and analysis of how information has been accumulated, analysed and disseminated in the past, and focuses on great shifts in the paradigm of human communications that have taken place in the history of mankind.  It offers a detailed account of the development of human communication, mass media, Internet, Web 2. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/eclap-rpt/ Mon, 08 Jul 2013 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/eclap-rpt/ The beautiful city of Porto was the host location for ECLAP 2013 [1], the 2nd International Conference on Information Technologies for Performing Arts, Media Access and Entertainment.  Porto is the second largest city in Portugal after Lisbon and home of the Instituto Politécnico do Porto (IPP), the largest polytechnic in the country, with over 18,500 students. IPP has 7 different faculties, the School of Music and Arts - Escola Superior de Música, Artes e Espectáculo (ESMAE) [2] - is one of the two original schools established when IPP was founded in 1985. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/jabes-rpt/ Mon, 08 Jul 2013 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/jabes-rpt/ In what has now become something of a tradition, the ‘Corum’ Congress Centre in Montpellier, France, hosted the twelfth in the series of the Journées de l’Agence Bibliographique de l’Enseignement Supérieur (ABES - Higher Education Bibliographic Agency) [1]. The main objectives of ABES are the development and maintainance of the shared catalogue of French academic libraries (Système Universitaire de Documentation, SUDOC) [2], the management of the theses processes and the administrative and financial support for group purchasing of e-resources for Higher Education. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/garrett-et-al/ Mon, 08 Jul 2013 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/garrett-et-al/ KAPTUR (2011-13) [1], funded by Jisc and led by the Visual Arts Data Service, was a collaborative project involving four institutional partners: the Glasgow School of Arts; Goldsmiths, University of London; University for the Creative Arts; and the University of the Arts London. Research data have in recent years become regarded as a valuable institutional resource and their appropriate collection, curation, publication and preservation as essential. This has been driven by a number of internal and external forces, and all UK Research Councils now require it as a condition of funding [2]. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/henshaw-kiley/ Mon, 08 Jul 2013 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/71/henshaw-kiley/ Online access is now the norm for many spheres of discovery and learning. What benefits bricks-and-mortar libraries have to offer in this digital age is a subject of much debate and concern, and will continue to be so as learning resources and environments shift ever more from the physical to the virtual. In order to maintain a place in this dual environment, most research libraries strive to replicate their traditional offerings in the digital world. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/70/codata-2012-rpt/ Fri, 30 Nov 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/70/codata-2012-rpt/ CODATA was formed by the International Council for Science (ICSU) in 1966 to co-ordinate and harmonise the use of data in science and technology. One of its very earliest decisions was to hold a conference every two years at which new developments could be reported. The first conference was held in Germany in 1968, and over the following years it would be held in  15 different countries across 4 continents. My colleague Monica Duke and I attended the most recent conference in Taipei both to represent the Digital Curation Centre – CODATA's national member for the UK – and to participate in a track of talks on data publication and citation. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/70/dobreva-rvw/ Fri, 30 Nov 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/70/dobreva-rvw/ Writing about information and the changes in the models of its production, distribution and consumption is no simple task. Besides the long-standing debate on what information and knowledge really mean, the world of current technologies is changing at a pace which inevitably influences all spheres of human activity. But the first of those spheres to tackle is perhaps that of information – how we create, disseminate, and use it. This book looks into the core of the changes in the last years, and is very much about the interplay of new technologies and how we humans deal with information in this changing technological world. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/70/editorial/ Fri, 30 Nov 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/70/editorial/ Welcome to Issue 70 of Ariadne which is full to the brim with feature articles and a wide range of event reports and book reviews. In Gold Open Access: Counting the Costs Theo Andrew explains the significance of the recent RCUK amendment to their Open Access policy requirements of researchers and the importance assumed by the cost of publishing the Gold Open Access route. Unsurprisingly, there is currently a great variability in such costs to research institutions, while, with few exceptions, publishers are as yet slow to impart what effect the move to charging for article processing will have on current institutional subscription costs. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/70/tpdl-2012-rpt/ Fri, 30 Nov 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/70/tpdl-2012-rpt/ The 16th International Conference on Theory and Practice of Digital Libraries (TPDL) 2012 [1] was another successful event in the series of ECDL/TPDL conferences which has been the leading European scientific forum on digital libraries for 15 years. Across these years, the conference has brought together researchers, developers, content providers and users in the field of digital libraries by addressing issues in the area where theoretical and applied research meet, such as digital library models, architectures, functionality, users, and quality. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/70/gartner/ Fri, 30 Nov 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/70/gartner/ Parliamentary historians in the United Kingdom are particularly fortunate as their key primary source, the record of Parliamentary proceedings, is almost entirely available in digitised form. Similarly, those needing to consult and study contemporary proceedings as scholars, journalists or citizens have access to the daily output of the UK's Parliaments and Assemblies in electronic form shortly after their proceedings take place. Unfortunately, the full potential of this resource for all of these users is limited by the fact that it is scattered throughout a heterogeneous information landscape and so cannot be approached as a unitary resource. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/69/eduserv-2012-rpt/ Mon, 30 Jul 2012 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/69/eduserv-2012-rpt/ The annual Eduserv Symposium [1] was billed as a ‘must-attend event for IT professionals in Higher Education’; the choice of topical subject matter being one of the biggest crowd-drawers (the other being the amazing venue: the Royal College of Physicians). The past few years have seen coverage of highly topical areas such as virtualisation and the cloud, the mobile university and access management. This year’s theme of big data is certainly stimulating interest, but what exactly are the implications for those working in research, learning, and operations in Higher Education? http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/68/hopkinson-zargaryan/ Fri, 09 Mar 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/68/hopkinson-zargaryan/ Early writing which first appeared as cuneiform protocols and then emerged in manuscript form and as printed materials is currently entering a new stage in its development – in the form of electronic publications. The Internet has drastically changed our understanding of access to library resources, to publication schemas, and has introduced brand new ways of information delivery. And as a result, the present situation could be described as a continuous increase in the amount of material being published only in electronic form, together with wide-scale conversion of paper-based material to digital formats. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/68/azzolini-rvw/ Tue, 06 Mar 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/68/azzolini-rvw/ Librarians, archivists, and records managers do not share identical challenges or controversies in their practical endeavours or theoretical queries. However, a common issue for all the information professions and a dominating topic of discussion in their literature is the fundamental change in the structure and distribution of knowledge caused by mass digitisation. The proliferation of daily digital content, in quantity, reach, and manifestation, is confronting them all with a disquieting role ambiguity. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/68/editorial2/ Tue, 06 Mar 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/68/editorial2/ I am pleased to introduce you to the content of Issue 68, and to have the opportunity to remind you that you have a far larger number of channels into the publication’s content. You can do so by using the Archive (for back issues), Authors or Articles tabs on the front page to search for material or information (in addition to the general search field top right) or you can casually browse the material offered by Today’s Choice, view the passing articles in the Gallery block to the right, or drill down into the Gallery from its tab. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/68/impact-rpt/ Tue, 06 Mar 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/68/impact-rpt/ The IMPACT Project (Improving Access to Text) [1] was funded by the European Commission back in 2007 to look at significantly advancing access to historical text using Optical Character Recognition (OCR) methods. As the project reaches its conclusion, one of its key objectives is sharing project outputs. The final conference was a 2-day event held over 24 - 25 October 2011 at the British Library in London where it demonstrated findings, showcased tools and presented related research in the field of OCR and language technology. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/68/fpw11-rpt/ Tue, 06 Mar 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/68/fpw11-rpt/ We have all heard at least some of the extraordinary statistics that attempt to capture the sheer size and ephemeral nature of the Web. According to the Digital Preservation Coalition (DPC), more than 70 new domains are registered and more than 500,000 documents are added to the Web every minute [1]. This scale, coupled with its ever-evolving use, present significant challenges to those concerned with preserving both the content and context of the Web. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/68/escidoc-rpt/ Tue, 06 Mar 2012 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/68/escidoc-rpt/ eSciDoc is a well-known open source platform for creating eResearch environments using generic services and tools based on a shared infrastructure. This concept allows for managing research and publication data together with related metadata, internal and/or external links and access rights. Development of eSciDoc was initiated by a collaborative venture between FIZ Karlsruhe – Leibniz Institute for Information Infrastructure and the Max Planck Digital Library (MPDL) and was funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/67/azzolini-rvw/ Sun, 03 Jul 2011 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/67/azzolini-rvw/ Since networked information technology has initiated a breathtaking transformation of knowledge practices, librarians have had a generous supply of thought leaders whose lifetime experience has permitted them to issue credible translations of the 'writing on the wall'. Recently, however, there seems to be many more analysts (and soothsayers) and much more anxious observation and published interpretation of such writing. And the message comes in a red ink, in bold, and with distinct portent, when not downright ominous. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/67/day-rvw/ Sun, 03 Jul 2011 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/67/day-rvw/ Over the past 20 years a great deal of information and guidance has been published to support cultural heritage organisations interested in undertaking digitisation projects. It is well over a decade now since the seminal Joint National Preservation Office and Research Libraries Group Preservation Conference on Guidelines for digital imaging [1] and standard introductory texts on digitisation like Anne Kenney and Oya Rieger's Moving theory into practice [2] and Stuart Lee's Digital imaging: a practical handbook [3] are of a similar age - although still extremely useful. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/67/editorial/ Sun, 03 Jul 2011 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/67/editorial/ For readers who might have been wondering, I shall resist Mark Twain’s remark about reports of his demise being exaggerated, and reassure you that while Ariadne has been undergoing changes to the way in which it will be delivered to the Web, it has been business as usual in the matter of the content, as you will see from the paragraphs that follow. Issue 67, while currently not looking any different, is in the process of being migrated to a new platform developed to enhance functionality and give a more user-friendly look and feel to the publication. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/67/scaife/ Sun, 03 Jul 2011 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/67/scaife/ When I started as Technical Services Librarian at the Institute of Education (IOE) in September 2009, one of the first tasks I was given was to do something about all the broken links in the catalogue. Link rot [1] is the bane of the Systems Librarian’s life and I was well aware that you had to run fast to stand still. It is characterised by the decay of a static URL which has, for example, been placed in a library catalogue to reference a relevant Web site resource which has subsequently been moved to a different server or else removed altogether. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/67/rinaldo-et-al/ Sun, 03 Jul 2011 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/67/rinaldo-et-al/ The Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) [1] is a consortium of 12 natural history and botanical libraries that co-operate to digitise and make accessible the legacy literature of biodiversity held in their collections and to make that literature available for open access and responsible use as a part of a global ‘biodiversity commons.’ [2] The participating libraries hold more than two million volumes of biodiversity literature collected over 200 years to support the work of scientists, researchers and students in their home institutions and throughout the world. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/66/chapman/ Sun, 30 Jan 2011 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/66/chapman/ Earlier this year UKOLN received an email informing us that the server hosting the Tap into Bath collection description database was due to be decommissioned towards the end of 2010. Although there had been some previous discussion over the future of the database, the email was the trigger for a formal review of the project. This article describes the preservation strategy that was developed and the steps that were taken to preserve information about the database and the software. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/65/cig-2010-rpt/ Fri, 29 Oct 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/65/cig-2010-rpt/ The focus of this conference was initiatives to get through the current economic climate. Cataloguing departments are under threat of cutbacks as never before. Papers on streamlining, collaborative enterprises, shared catalogues and services, recycling and repurposing of content using metadata extraction techniques combined to give a flavour of the new thrift driving management. The continuing progress of the long awaited Resource Description and Access (RDA)[1][2] towards becoming the new international cataloguing standard was another hot topic. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/65/open-culture-rpt/ Fri, 29 Oct 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/65/open-culture-rpt/ The Europeana Conference is a free annual event which highlights current challenges for libraries, museums, archives and audio-visual archives and which looks for practical solutions for the future. It connects the main actors in cultural and scientific heritage in order to build networks and establish future collaborations. The Europeana Open Culture 2010 Conference [1] was the third annual conference and the biggest so far. It focused on how the cultural institutions can create public value by making digital, cultural and scientific information openly available. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/65/ili-2010-rpt/ Fri, 29 Oct 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/65/ili-2010-rpt/ Thursday 14 OctoberTrack A: Looking Ahead to ValueA102: Future of Academic LibrariesMal Booth, University of Technology Sydney (Australia)Michael Jubb, Research Information Network (UK)Mal Booth from the University of Technology Sydney started the session by giving an insight into current plans and projects underway to inform a new library building due to open in 2015 as part of a major redeveloped city campus. As this new building should be able to respond to demands for many years to come, Mal emphasised how important it is to consider the future users as well as library and technology developments. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/65/repos-fringe-2010-rpt/ Fri, 29 Oct 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/65/repos-fringe-2010-rpt/ 2010 was the third year of Repository Fringe, and slightly more formally organised than its antecedents, with an increased number of discursive presentations and less in the way of organised chaos! The proceedings began on Wednesday 1 September with a one-day, pre-event SHERPA/RoMEO API Workshop [1] run by the Repositories Support Project team. 2 September 2010Opening the event proper on Thursday morning, Sheila Cannell, Director of Library Services, University of Edinburgh, used the imminent Edinburgh festival fireworks as a metaphor for the repository development endeavour. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/65/survive-thrive-rpt/ Fri, 29 Oct 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/65/survive-thrive-rpt/ Survive or Thrive [1] is the punchy title given to an event intended to stimulate serious consideration amongst digital collections practitioners about future directions in our field - opportunities but also potential pitfalls. The event, which focused on content in HE, comes at a time of financial uncertainty when proving value is of increasing importance in the sector and at a point when significant investment has already been made in the UK into content creation, set against a backdrop of increasingly available content on the open Web from a multitude of sources. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/blue-ribbon-uk-2010-rpt/ Thu, 29 Jul 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/blue-ribbon-uk-2010-rpt/ On Thursday 6 May 2010 an historic event took place. The event allowed people to express their opinions on potential future action in a highly significant area. No, not the British general election, and I'm sure the concurrence of dates was unintentional! This event was the Blue Ribbon Task Force Symposium on sustainable digital preservation and access, held at the Wellcome Collection Conference Centre in London [1]. The symposium, companion event to the national conversation which took place in Washington DC in April 2010 [2], provided an opportunity for stakeholders to respond to the recent Blue Ribbon Task Force report. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/rafiq-rvw/ Thu, 29 Jul 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/rafiq-rvw/ Digital Information offers an overview of the digital landscape based on the heterogeneous perspectives of multiple stakeholders contributed by the experts from Higher Education, publishers' community, information professionals, and legal experts. This overview presents seven well written chapters by an international team of experts who have contributed well to the debate of digital information in the context of order or anarchy. The book seems to answer the million-dollar question of today's information world: http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/bremner-rvw/ Thu, 29 Jul 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/bremner-rvw/ The PreambleI have been building online ‘communities of practice’ for about 10 years now. Some have thrived and others not. It started about 10 years ago with the formation of a small association with a shared interest in classic marine heritage. The community operated entirely online, mainly through a forum and we found that, with very little conscious effort, the community quickly grew and thrived. It was quickly taken up as an example of good practice and evidence for what could be achieved within a small community with similar interests and aspirations. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/editorial/ Thu, 29 Jul 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/editorial/ In these cash-strapped times among all the admonitions to save money here, and resources there, I rather hope to hear much about the necessity of protecting and building the knowledge economy if the UK is to make its way in the globalised world, since we cannot pretend to compete easily in other areas of endeavour. Hence research has to be regarded as one of the aces remaining to us, and thus I hope the importance of gathering, managing and preserving for long-term access research outcomes will be widely appreciated and supported. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/joyce-et-al/ Thu, 29 Jul 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/joyce-et-al/ Increasingly, library and information services are under pressure to demonstrate value for money. Against the backdrop of search engine dominance, economic instability, and rapid technological development, Intute, a JISC-funded free national service which delivers the best of the Web for education and research, is facing reduced funding and an uncertain future. This article will share its successes and achievements, put a spotlight on the human expertise of its contributors and partners, and reflect on lessons learnt in the context of the sustainability of library and information services. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/fay/ Thu, 29 Jul 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/fay/ Digital collections at LSE (London School of Economics and Political Science)[1] are significant and growing, as are the requirements of their users. LSE Library collects materials relevant to research and teaching in the social sciences, crossing the boundaries between personal and organisational archives, rare and unique printed collections and institutional research outputs. Digital preservation is an increasing concern alongside our commitment to continue to develop innovative digital services for researchers and students. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/salo/ Thu, 29 Jul 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/salo/ Eager to prove their relevance among scholars leaving print behind, libraries have participated vocally in the last half-decade's conversation about digital research data. On the surface, libraries would seem to have much human and technological infrastructure ready-constructed to repurpose for data: digital library platforms and institutional repositories may appear fit for purpose. However, unless libraries understand the salient characteristics of research data, and how they do and do not fit with library processes and infrastructure, they run the risk of embarrassing missteps as they come to grips with the data challenge. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/gambles/ Thu, 29 Jul 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/gambles/ The Library of Birmingham (LoB) will open in 2013 as a world-class centre for culture, learning and knowledge, rewriting the book for public libraries in the 21st century. 'Rewriting the Book', which is integral to the new LoB brand, recognises and embraces the present and future challenge to libraries – it accepts that established means of accessing knowledge are changing rapidly and dynamically, with a significant digital dimension, and that increasingly radical responses to this challenge are demanded from leaders in the library sector. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/holley/ Thu, 29 Jul 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/64/holley/ In late 2009 the National Library of Australia released version 1 of Trove [1] to the public. Trove is a free search engine. It searches across a large aggregation of Australian content. The treasure is over 90 million items from over 1000 libraries, museums, archives and other organisations which can be found at the click of a button. Finding information just got easier for many Australians. Exploring a wealth of resources and digital content like never before, including full-text books, journals and newspaper articles, images, music, sound, video, maps, Web sites, diaries, letters, archives, people and organisations has been an exciting adventure for users and the service has been heavily used. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/63/ridolfo-et-al/ Thu, 29 Apr 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/63/ridolfo-et-al/ Archive 2.0 is relatively new concept for us, one that we have only worked with since 2007 and the beginning of our Samaritan Digital Archive Project at Michigan State University (MSU). Our project started with the intention of building a digital archive; the Archive 2.0 nature of the project surfaced when we realised that in order to build a useful archive, we would need to engage multiple stakeholder communities. In our project this meant working with the cultural stakeholders, the Samaritans, as well as academic stakeholders, including Samaritan and Biblical scholars. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/63/editorial/ Thu, 29 Apr 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/63/editorial/ For those who can either remember or are battling still to make the technology work, be it coding, integration or test, it is easy and understandable enough if the technology assumes an overwhelming profile on the horizon of one's project and daily work. It is very understandable when they privately grumble that colleagues unburdened with the minutiae of such work display a breath-taking insouciance to the consequences of asking for a change in spec because there has been an unexpected development in the requirements of the users. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/63/niso-d2d-rpt/ Thu, 29 Apr 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/63/niso-d2d-rpt/ A crisp spring day in Atlanta saw a gathering of 50 participants coming from libraries, including many from the GALILEO consortium, from vendors, including sponsors Ex Libris and Innovative Interfaces, Inc., and from content providers such as JSTOR, for a series of presentations at the well-equipped and comfortable Georgia Tech Global Learning Center, Atlanta, Georgia, USA. The agenda [1] was an interesting mix of perspectives on a theme - switching focus from information resource users, particularly students, and how studying and interacting with them can inform our discovery and delivery systems, to details of ‘behind the scenes’ of these systems, technologies and standards such as OpenURL and SSO (Single Sign-on), and improvements needed to deliver more seamlessly what users want, as well as the development of new services such as bX recommender and BookServer. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/63/planets-2010-rome-rpt/ Thu, 29 Apr 2010 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/63/planets-2010-rome-rpt/ In far more dramatic circumstances than expected, the Planets Project [1] held its 3-day training event Digital Preservation – The Planets Way in Rome over 19 - 21 April 2010. This article reports its proceedings. The venue chosen for this Planets training event, the last of a series of five held over the past 12 months around Europe, was the prestigious Pontifica Universitata Gregoriana – the first Jesuit University, founded over 450 years ago in the heart of Rome and only a few minutes’ walk from the Trevi Fountain. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/62/maidmentotlet-redfearn/ Sat, 30 Jan 2010 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/62/maidmentotlet-redfearn/ At the end of November 2009, JISC launched a year-long suite of activities under the heading Research 3.0: driving the knowledge economy. A series of events, publications and Web activity are stimulating discussion about how advanced digital technologies are creating a revolution in research and the way researchers work. With a central role in making these technologies available, JISC is also hoping to learn more about the concerns, views and requirements of researchers and the institutions that support them, especially given the financial constraints they are now under. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/62/flinn/ Sat, 30 Jan 2010 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/62/flinn/ This article was originally delivered as a paper for the ‘Archives 2.0: Shifting Dialogues Between Users and Archivists’ conference organised by the University of Manchester’s ESRC Centre for Research on Socio-Cultural Change (CRESC) in March 2009. The paper came at an opportune time. I was absorbed in a research project examining independent and community archival initiatives in the UK and exploring the possibilities of user- (or community-)generated and contributed content for archives and historical research [1]. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/62/bl-subject-repos-rpt/ Sat, 30 Jan 2010 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/62/bl-subject-repos-rpt/ Institutional repositories are now common in Higher Education, but successful examples of subject repositories, which cater to an entire discipline, are much rarer. The Subject Repositories conference taught some key lessons about the role of transnational collaboration in setting up a subject repository. The conference drew on the expertise of renowned specialists in the field and the two and a half-year-long development process of Economists Online [1]. Economists Online was created by the Network of European Economists Online (NEEO) [2], which consists of 24 European and international partners (disclosure: the author was a work package leader for this project and one of the conference organisers). http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/62/dp-rdshw-rpt/ Sat, 30 Jan 2010 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/62/dp-rdshw-rpt/ A series of roadshows has been travelling up and down the country through 2009 and 2010 to spread the key message that making a start in digital preservation does not need to be either expensive or difficult. This simple message has been delivered in eight different cities in some 80 separate presentations and to an audience of around 400 archivists and records managers. The Roadshows are almost over: more formal evaluation will follow in due course. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/61/editorial/ Fri, 30 Oct 2009 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/61/editorial/ Perhaps one of the current benchmarks for gauging when a Web technology has migrated from the cluttered desks of the technorati to the dining tables of the chatterati is if it becomes a topic for BBC Radio 4's The Moral Maze [1]. More accustomed to discussing matters such as child-rearing or a controversial pronouncement of the Archbishop of Canterbury, the panel members who, over the years have ranged from the liberal to the harrumphing illiberal (and in one case, both at the same time), recently did battle over Twitter [2]. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/61/newsline/ Fri, 30 Oct 2009 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/61/newsline/ 5th International Digital Curation Conference – Moving to Multi-Scale Science: Managing Complexity and DiversityMillennium Gloucester Hotel, Kensington, London 2-4 December 2009 http://www.dcc.ac.uk/events/dcc-2009/ The International Digital Curation Conference is an established annual event reaching out to individuals, organisations and institutions across all disciplines and domains involved in curating data for e-science and e-research. The Digital Curation Centre, which is responsible for organising the Conference, will be hosting a full day of workshops on 2 December including Disciplinary Dimensions of Digital Curation: New Perspectives on Research Data; Digital Curation 101 Lite Training; Citability of Research Data; and Repository Preservation Infrastructure (REPRISE). http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/61/bevan/ Fri, 30 Oct 2009 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/61/bevan/ The National Library of Wales has recently published a new Strategy for the Web [1] which integrates Web 2.0 with the existing Web portfolio and seeks to provide an approach to Web 2.0 which is focused on the organisation. Rather than centring on technical developments, this paper outlines a strategic research approach and discusses some of the outcomes which may speak to others seeking to engage with emerging Web technologies and approaches. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/61/strsp-rpt/ Fri, 30 Oct 2009 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/61/strsp-rpt/ I recently attended the Back to School event [1] run by the Repositories Support Project (RSP)[2] at Matfen Hall [3], Northumberland, where I gave a workshop on metadata and also attended the second and third days of the event as a delegate. I was sorry not to be able to attend the sessions on the first day, but arrived in time for dinner so was able to meet the delegates and other presenters. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/61/marchionni/ Fri, 30 Oct 2009 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/61/marchionni/ Do we know enough about what our users' needs are when creating online digitised scholarly resources? What are the benefits of engaging users? In what way can they be useful to the process? These might sound like rhetorical questions, yet, looking back at the last decade of activity in digitisation and creation of online resources, such questions have been tackled by content providers only in part, and with various degrees of success. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/palmer/ Wed, 29 Jul 2009 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/palmer/ In March 2009, the ESRC Centre for Research on Socio-Cultural Change (CRESC) based at the University of Manchester collaborated with the Archives Hub to host a small conference of approximately 50 people in Manchester. ‘Archives 2.0’: Shifting Dialogues Between Users and Archivists’ was the final event in a series of CRESC events on archiving and reusing qualitative data. These events aimed to develop new approaches to archiving and reusing data and also to contribute to a recent rethinking of the archive in history, oral history, cultural studies The conference focused on the relationship between archivists, archives and their users, and looked at the emerging phenomenon of so-called ‘Archives 2. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/isko-2009-rpt/ Wed, 29 Jul 2009 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/isko-2009-rpt/ I recently attended the first biennial Conference of the British Chapter of the International Society for Knowledge Organization (ISKO UK) [1] entitled ‘Content Architecture: Exploiting and Managing Diverse Resources’. It was organized in co-operation with the Department of Information Studies, University College London. If the intention was to focus on the diversity of resources out there, I also felt that the audience was very diverse in terms of levels of expertise and perspectives. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/hess-et-al/ Wed, 29 Jul 2009 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/hess-et-al/ Introduction: The Evolving Field of Artefact DocumentationDigital heritage technologies promise a greater understanding of cultural objects cared for by museums. Recent technological advances in digital photography and image processing not only offer a high level of documentation, they also provide powerful analytical tools for conservation monitoring of cultural objects. Museums are increasingly turning to digital documentation and relational databases to administer their collections for a variety of tasks: detailed description, intervention planning, loan. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/gray/ Wed, 29 Jul 2009 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/gray/ Those involved in Higher Education (HE) may have started to sense the approach of Institutional Repositories (IRs). Leaving aside the unfortunate nomenclature, IRs are becoming a fact of life in many educational institutions. The Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) has invested £14million in the Repositories and Preservation Programme [1] and the recent Repositories and Preservation Programme Meeting in Birmingham [2] celebrated the end of over 40 individual repository projects under the Start Up and Enhancement [3] strand. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/jisc-digi-content-rpt/ Wed, 29 Jul 2009 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/jisc-digi-content-rpt/ In the bucolic setting of the Cotswolds, on one of the hottest weeks of the summer, 200 delegates gathered to discuss the future of online content and to examine why UK universities need a sustainable digital content strategy to deliver successfully accessible learning and research materials for the future. Over two days, the delegates heard from a series of keynote speakers in plenary sessions and attended breakout ‘strand sessions’ on five different themes: Managing Content; Content Development Strategies; Content in Education; User Engagement; and Looking into the Future. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/newsline/ Wed, 29 Jul 2009 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/newsline/ JISC Digital Media Course: Introduction to Image MetadataILRT, 8-10 Berkeley Square, Bristol, BS8 1HH Wednesday 9 December 2009 Full-day course: 10.00 - 16.30 http://www.jiscdigitalmedia.ac.uk/training/courses/introduction-to-image-metadata/ AimThis course is designed specifically to help you consider how to effectively incorporate metadata into the fabric of your image collection, through explanation, discussion and practical activities. AudienceAnyone new to describing and cataloguing images. Some previous knowledge of metadata will be useful but not essential. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/or-09-rpt/ Wed, 29 Jul 2009 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/or-09-rpt/ I recently attended the annual Open Repositories 2009 Conference [1] in Atlanta, Georgia which hosted 326 delegates from 23 countries. For myself, as the SWORD [2] Project Manager, the event proved to be very worthwhile. My colleague Julie Allinson and I were both able to give a plenary presentation on the first day and a half-day workshop on the final day. Much of the conference addressed developments surrounding the Fedora, DSpace and EPrints systems that have occurred over the last year. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/allinson-harbord/ Wed, 29 Jul 2009 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/allinson-harbord/ The University Library & Archives' first venture into digital repositories was as part of the White Rose partnership in the original SHERPA Project [1]. Leeds, Sheffield and York universities have had a research partnership for some years and the library services became a consortial partner in SHERPA in 2002 to set up a joint e-prints repository called White Rose Research Online (WRRO) [2] . During the project which ran from 2002-2006, advocacy about Open Access and the need for wider dissemination of research outputs got underway at York. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/hawkins-tanner/ Wed, 29 Jul 2009 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/hawkins-tanner/ The Historic Hospitals Admission Records Project (HHARP) is a digitisation and indexing project that covers the Victorian and Edwardian admission registers for the London children's hospitals Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH), the Evelina Children's Hospital in Southwark and the Alexandra Hip Hospital in Bloomsbury, together with Yorkhill Children's Hospital in Glasgow. It represents a collaboration between archivists, academics and volunteers that has resulted in a product that we hope will be of use to all those interested in the records of Victorian and Edwardian child health - from whichever academic discipline - or none [1]. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/takle/ Wed, 29 Jul 2009 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/60/takle/ The National Library of Norway is in the process of establishing itself as a digital national library and of taking on a key role in the country’s digital library service. The most ambitious outcome of this positioning is that the National Library has comprehensive plans to digitise its entire collection. The digital national library has been given the name NBdigital, and its objective of establishing itself as a digital library is also reflected in the institution’s practices. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/59/coelho-rvw/ Wed, 29 Apr 2009 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/59/coelho-rvw/ This book is about cultural continuity and change. It focuses on the debates about the impact of 'new technology' and 'the digital age' on the shaping of cultural spaces, the discourses between 'producers' and 'consumers' and the changing fabric of modern institutions. The effects of various digitisation endeavours on institutional identities and practices and on individual behaviours are analysed in order to demonstrate how digital technologies are 'enfolded into the fabric of specific institutional and broader cultural environments. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/59/russell/ Wed, 29 Apr 2009 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/59/russell/ EThOS 1 opened up access to UK doctoral theses in January 2009. It is a service by and for the research community. Although EThOS is still in beta version, it is already changing the way theses are accessed and is helping to raise the visibility of UK research. BackgroundDoctoral theses represent a special category of research writing and are the culmination of several years of intensive work. Traditionally difficult to access, they have as a result remained underused; so modernising access to research theses has been on the Higher Education agenda for many years in line with the changing characteristics of the working environment: http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/59/ifla-3p-rpt/ Wed, 29 Apr 2009 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/59/ifla-3p-rpt/ The IFLA Presidential Meeting ‘Access to Knowledge: Networking Libraries’ [1], was the third and last event in a series of conferences held during the IFLA presidency of Claudia Lux between 2007 and 2009. Intended as international platforms for exchange about the topic of ‘free access to information’, the motto shared by all three meetings, each of the conferences focused on a different cultural/geographical region: Central and Eastern Europe in 2007, Asia in 2008, and Arab and Islamic countries in 2009. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/59/impact-2009-rpt/ Wed, 29 Apr 2009 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/59/impact-2009-rpt/ The first conference of the IMPACT (Improving Access to Text) Project was held at the Koninklijke Bibliotheek, National Library of the Netherlands (KB) in The Hague on 6 and 7 April 2009. A total of 136 participants from over 30 countries attended. The main focus of the event was on Optical Character Recognition (OCR) technologies and their use in supporting the large-scale digitisation of historical text resources. It was also an opportunity to introduce the IMPACT Project to a wider audience and to describe some of its initial results. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/58/law/ Fri, 30 Jan 2009 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/58/law/ By Scottish standards, Strathclyde is a new university, being a mere two hundred years old. It is a large university with 20,000 students, some forty departments covering most disciplines other than medicine and a huge programme of continuing professional development (CPD). Set up as 'a place of useful learning' it has always specialised in the applied disciplines – business, engineering, professional training (teachers, lawyers and social workers) and has set out to be quite different from its better-known competitors. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/58/editorial/ Fri, 30 Jan 2009 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/58/editorial/ Having returned once more to the fray somewhat chastened by the experience of eye surgery, alone and without a general anaesthetic (with apologies to Rumpole and the late lamented John Mortimer [1] ), but hugely impressed by the ministrations of the NHS, I am struck once again by the enormous importance of people, both within the community that Ariadne serves as well as those domains beyond, and in which all are nonetheless increasingly, but quite naturally, dependent on technology for their success. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/58/newsline/ Fri, 30 Jan 2009 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/58/newsline/ JISC Digital Media (formerly TASI) Training ScheduleFour brand new courses are on offer for the 2009 season dealing with: Finding free images onlineEditing and managing images using Photoshop Lightroom 2Audio Production (recording lectures, seminars, interviews and podcasts)Digitising analogue video recordings.Courses are already filling up fast and several courses now have multiple dates to accommodate demand. Spring 2009 Programme:10 March 2009 Introduction to Photoshop Lightroom 2 http://www.tasi.ac.uk/training/training-photoshop-lightroom.html 19 March 2009 Copyright and Digital Images http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/58/sun-pasig-2008-11-rpt/ Fri, 30 Jan 2009 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/58/sun-pasig-2008-11-rpt/ I had managed to miss the previous two PASIG (Preservation and Archiving Special Interest Group)[1] meetings, so was delighted to find myself finally able to participate by attending the Fall meeting. Conveniently the event was arranged to follow immediately the SPARC Digital Repositories meeting [2], also held in Baltimore, and which I also attended. PASIG is a group sponsored by and centred on Sun Microsystems (Sun) which is a prominent vendor of data storage hardware and which is building a new business around systems to support digital preservation and archiving. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/58/boyle-et-al/ Fri, 30 Jan 2009 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/58/boyle-et-al/ Digital preservation is an area which is pervasive and challenging for many sectors – it impinges on the landscape from high-level business and e-government to an individual's personal digital memories. One sector where the challenges of preservation and long-term access to resources are well rehearsed is within the archives sector. There has been innovative research within the archives community including the Paradigm [1] and the DARP [2] projects. The initiative described in this article focuses on the local authority archives sector and is an outcome of collaborative work from the authors, the Digital Preservation Coalition (DPC) [3] and The National Archives (TNA) [4]. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/58/eckes-segbert/ Fri, 30 Jan 2009 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/58/eckes-segbert/ The European Film Gateway (EFG) [1] is one in a series of projects funded by the European Commission, under the eContentplus Programme, with the aim of contributing to the development and further enhancement of Europeana - the European digital library, museum and archive [2]. Officially launched on 20 November 2008, the prototype Europeana service provides access to about four million digital objects from archives, audio-visual archives, museums and libraries across Europe. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/58/nichols/ Fri, 30 Jan 2009 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/58/nichols/ There is no longer anything exotic about digital humanities projects. Almost every humanities faculty has at least one. But like humanities disciplines themselves, digital projects too often exist in lonely splendour, each in its own sub-disciplinary silo. Classicists have their project(s), Middle English scholars post Chaucer and Langland manuscripts, while French medievalists have sites for major genres or authors from the troubadours to Christine de Pizan, and beyond. The situation is not appreciably different for digital humanities projects dealing with modern topics. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/57/waaijers-et-al/ Thu, 30 Oct 2008 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/57/waaijers-et-al/ The view that the results of publicly financed research should also be publicly accessible enjoys broad support in the academic community. Where their own articles are concerned, however, many authors hesitate to circulate them openly, for example by publishing them in Open Access journals or placing them in their institution’s repository. They ask themselves whether that will not be at odds with the copyright rules and whether they will gain – or perhaps even lose – prestige. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/57/editorial/ Thu, 30 Oct 2008 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/57/editorial/ In her second Get Tooled Up article on the subject of remote working Staying Connected: Technologies Supporting Remote Workers, Marieke Guy takes a look at the many technologies that support remote working, from broadband to Web 2.0 social networking tools. Readers may also be interested to read her blog on remote working which I am definitely finding interesting [1]. I am greatly indebted to Marieke, who as many IWMW delegates will attest, is indisputably one of Life's finishers and who, in her delivery of both this article and its predecessor 'A Desk Too Far? http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/57/davies/ Thu, 30 Oct 2008 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/57/davies/ Europeana - the European digital library, museum and archive - is a two-year project that began in July 2007. It will produce a service giving users direct access initially to some two million digital objects, including film material, photos, paintings, sounds, maps, manuscripts, books, newspapers and archival papers, rising to a target of 10 million by 2010. The development of the Europeana service is a flagship activity of the European Digital Libraries Initiative [1] [2], designed to increase access to digital content across four identified key domains (libraries, museums, archives and audio/visual archives) is now gaining momentum. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/57/newsline/ Thu, 30 Oct 2008 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/57/newsline/ TASI Courses for Remainder of 2008TASI (the JISC Advisory Service for still images, moving images and sound) has a few places left on its autumn/winter training programme. http://www.tasi.ac.uk/training/training.html 14 November 2008 Optimising your Images using Adobe Photoshop21 November 2008 Introduction to Image Metadata27 November 2008 Essential Techniques in Digital Image Capture28 November 2008 Advanced Techniques in Digital Image Capture03 December 2008 Digital Photography - Taking Control of your SLR11 December 2008 Scanning with the CLA Licence12 December 2008 Copyright and Digital ImagesThe following newly released course has just been added to the programme: http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/57/eresearch-australasia-rpt/ Thu, 30 Oct 2008 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/57/eresearch-australasia-rpt/ The following overview of eResearch Australasia 2008 by Ann Borda is intended to give a sense of the diversity of the programme and key themes of the Conference at a glance. A selection of workshops and themes are explored in more detail by fellow contributing authors in the sections below: Bridget Soulsby on the 'Data Deluge', Gaby Bright on 'Uptake of eResearch' and Tobias Blanke on 'Arts & Humanities eResearch'. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/57/ipres-2008-rpt/ Thu, 30 Oct 2008 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/57/ipres-2008-rpt/ iPRES 2008, the Fifth International Conference on Digital Preservation, was held at the British Library on 29-30 September, 2008. From its beginnings five years ago, iPRES has retained its strong international flavour. This year, it brought together over 250 participants from 33 countries. iPRES has become a major international forum for the exchange of ideas and practice in Digital Preservation. The theme of the conference was ‘Joined Up and Working: tools and methods for digital preservation’. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/56/pasig-2008-05-rpt/ Tue, 29 Jul 2008 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/56/pasig-2008-05-rpt/ The third meeting of Sun's Preservation and Archiving Special Interest Group took place in San Francisco in May. The event, the third PASIG meeting in the last year, drew around 180 participants from Australasia, Asia, Europe and North America to discuss a broad range of issues surrounding digital repositories. Presentations ranged from geographically or community-themed high-level perspectives of repository- related activity, through to detailed technical analysis and reports of development activity at an institutional or project level. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/56/ukmw08-rpt/ Tue, 29 Jul 2008 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/56/ukmw08-rpt/ Following the success of the inaugural event last year [1], the Mashed Museum day was again held the day before the Museums Computer Group UK Museums on the Web Conference. The theme of the conference was 'connecting collections online', and the Mashed Museum day was a chance for museum ICT staff to put this into practice. The Mashed Museum DayEarlier this year I received an email that read: You are invited to a day of coding, thinking and idea sharing with a select group of museum colleagues. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/56/gatenby/ Tue, 29 Jul 2008 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/56/gatenby/ Libraries’ collections fall into three parts: physical, digital and licensed. These are managed by multiple systems, ILS (Integrated Library System), ERM (Electronic Records Management), digital management, digital repositories, resolvers, inter-library loan and reference. At the same time libraries are increasingly co-operating in collecting and storing resources. This article examines how to identify data that is best located at global, collective and local levels. An example is explored, namely the benefits of moving data from different local systems to the network level to manage acquisition of the total collection as a whole and in combination with consortia members. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/55/hannabuss-rvw/ Tue, 29 Apr 2008 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/55/hannabuss-rvw/ This is an impressive and very useful book. It is impressive in drawing on a wide range of relevant ideas (on history, society, culture, technology) to tease out the ways in which we can validly speak about the cultural aspects of digital information. It is very useful because it will almost instantly join lists of recommended reading wherever information, knowledge and library studies are formally taught (it clearly derives from lectures but is all the clearer for that in this case, with none of the pedestrianism and derivativeness associated with that origin). http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/55/henty/ Tue, 29 Apr 2008 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/55/henty/ The growing capacity of ICT to contribute to research of all kinds has excited researchers the world over as they invent new ways of conducting research and enjoy the benefits of bigger and more sophisticated computers and communications systems to support measurement, analysis, collaboration and publishing. The expanding rate of ICT development is matched by the numbers of people wanting to join in this funfest, by growth in the amount of data being generated, and by demands for new and improved hardware, software, networks, and data storage. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/55/williams-et-al/ Tue, 29 Apr 2008 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/55/williams-et-al/ Personal collections such as those kept in the British Library have long documented diverse careers and lives, and include a wide variety of document (and artefact) types, formats and relationships. In recent years these collections have become ever more ‘digital’. Not surprisingly, given the inexorable march of technological innovation, individuals are capturing and storing an ever-increasing amount of digital information about or for themselves, including documents, articles, portfolios of work, digital images, and audio and video recordings [1]. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/55/lai-2008-rpt/ Tue, 29 Apr 2008 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/55/lai-2008-rpt/ 15 April The conference, entitled ‘Future-proofing the Past: 80 years’ commitment to access and cooperation’, was officially opened by the President of the Library Association of Ireland (LAI) who welcomed the delegates and wished them well in their deliberations at this conference which was the 40th joint conference of the LAI and Cilip IRELAND, occurring in the 80th year of the LAI. The conference was attended by 120 delegates. Unless otherwise stated, the sessions described below were all plenary. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/55/jisc-debates-rpt/ Tue, 29 Apr 2008 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/55/jisc-debates-rpt/ As part of its new Libraries of the Future programme [1], JISC held three events during its annual conference in Birmingham to explore some of the questions facing libraries today: in an information world in which Google apparently offers us everything, what place is there for the traditional, and even the digital, library? In a library environment which is increasingly moving to the delivery of online rather than print resources, what of the academic library’s traditional place at the heart of campus life? http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/55/maccoll/ Tue, 29 Apr 2008 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/55/maccoll/ RLG Programs became part of OCLC in the summer of 2006. In November of last year, RLG Programs announced the appointment of a European Director, John MacColl. This article explains the rationale behind the combination of RLG with the OCLC Office of Research, and describes the work programme of the new Programs and Research Group. It argues for co-operation as the necessary response to the challenges presented to research libraries as the Web changes the way researchers work, and it lays out a new programme dedicated to research outputs, which will have significant European Partner involvement. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/55/vandeventer-pienaar/ Tue, 29 Apr 2008 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/55/vandeventer-pienaar/ Knowledge exchange is critical for development. 'Bridging the knowledge divide' does not only refer to the North-South divide. It also refers to the divide between richer and poorer countries within the same region as well as to the divide between larger and smaller organisations within one country. Lastly it refers to the divide between those individuals who have access to an environment that allows for rapid knowledge creation and those less fortunate. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/55/eadie/ Tue, 29 Apr 2008 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/55/eadie/ Following on from the project to develop an application profile for scholarly works (SWAP)[1], the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) has recently funded through its Repositories and Preservation Programme, a series of projects to establish Application Profiles in the areas of images, time-based media, geospatial data and learning objects [2]. The work on the Images Application Profile (IAP) has been carried out for the six-month period from September 2007 to March 2008, and while the substantive project work is now complete and a draft Images Application Profile is in circulation, the ongoing job of promoting the profile to, and consulting with, the image, repository and metadata communities continues. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/54/civallero/ Wed, 30 Jan 2008 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/54/civallero/ Cultural HeritageHeritage can be defined as a heterogeneous ensemble of environmental and cultural elements - material or otherwise - that are transmitted from generation to generation, creating the foundations on which people build and orientate their identity and vision of the world. According to the definition reached during the UNESCO Experts´ Round Table in Turin (Italy, 2001), heritage includes: ’… peoples’ learned processes along with the knowledge, skills and creativity that inform and are developed by them, the products they create, and the resources, spaces and other aspects of the social and natural context necessary to their sustainability’. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/54/lafortune-rvws/ Wed, 30 Jan 2008 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/54/lafortune-rvws/ Sul H. Lee is professor of Library and Information Studies at the University of Oklahoma and Dean of University of Oklahoma Libraries. He is also the editor of Haworth's Journal of Library Administration. As a recognised scholar and an administrator of a large university research library, it is not surprising that he is able to bring together some of the leading library administrators in the US to give their insights on the challenges and opportunities that libraries now face from the massive influx of digital resources. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/54/heath-et-al/ Wed, 30 Jan 2008 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/54/heath-et-al/ In most of the discussions about e-publications and open access (OA) in recent years, the focus of attention has tended to be on the interests and needs of researchers in the sciences, and of the libraries that seek to serve them. Significantly less attention has been paid to the needs and interests of researchers in the arts and humanities; and indeed e-publication and open access initiatives, and general awareness of the key issues and debates, are much less advanced in the arts and humanities than in the sciences. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/53/maccoll-dempsey-rvw/ Tue, 30 Oct 2007 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/53/maccoll-dempsey-rvw/ First, a note about this reviewer. I am not a library historian although I am interested in our professional and institutional development. I received my library education in Ireland, although I have worked for much of my career in the UK and am now in the US. I observed the developments discussed in the latter parts of this volume and have contributed to the literature about them. I have met many of the contributors and am familiar with the writings of others. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/53/hilton-thompson/ Tue, 30 Oct 2007 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/53/hilton-thompson/ In a previous article [1] we discussed how the Wellcome Library had accepted that born digital material [2] will form part of its collections in the future. Work is now under way to give practical shape to these plans, and in the last six months born digital archival material has begun to be acquired by the Library. This article assesses the progress that has been made and discusses the experiences, and challenges, of dealing with real digital material. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/53/digitising-culture-rpt/ Tue, 30 Oct 2007 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/53/digitising-culture-rpt/ The idiom of the ‘elephant in the room’ is one often conjured up when an obvious fact or presence is not acknowledged for fear that doing so will radically disturb people’s acceptance of the status quo. The conference in Berlin, Knowledge By Networking, Digitising Culture in Germany and Europe [1], had something of the elephant in the room. In this case the unmentioned presence was not the elephant, but the search engine Google. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/53/newsline/ Tue, 30 Oct 2007 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/53/newsline/ TASI Workshops in November & DecemberThere are currently places available on the following Nov/Dec workshops: 14 November 2007: Image Capture - Level 3, Bristol15 November 2007: Introduction to Image Metadata, Bristol23 November 2007: Image Optimisation - Correcting and Preparing Images, Bristol30 November 2007: Building a Departmental Image Collection, Bristol4 December 2007: Colour Management, Bristol13 December 2007: Photoshop - Level 1, Bristol14 December 2007: Photoshop - Level 2, BristolFull details of these and all TASI workshops are available from the Training page http://www. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/53/fp6-2007-rpt/ Tue, 30 Oct 2007 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/53/fp6-2007-rpt/ Digital preservation has become an area of strategic importance for the European Union in recent years. This has been reflected in the investment of €17 million in co-funding three major digital preservation projects under call 5 of its Framework Programme 6 in September 2005. Planets (Preservation and Long-term Access through NETworked Services) [1], CASPAR (Artistic and Scientific knowledge for Preservation, Access and Retrieval) [2] and DPE (DigitalPreservationEurope) [3] are all co-ordinated by British organisations: Planets by the British Library, CASPAR by the Science and Technology Facilities Council (formerly CCLRC) and DPE by the Humanities Advanced Technology and Information Institute (HATII) at the University of Glasgow. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/53/ooman-tzouvaras/ Tue, 30 Oct 2007 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/53/ooman-tzouvaras/ Europe's audiovisual heritage contains both a record and a representation of the past and as such it demonstrates the development of the 'audiovisual culture' we inhabit today. In this article we hope to offer an insight into the development of the Video Active Portal [1] which provides access broadcast heritage material retained by archives across Europe. We will explain how Video Active needed to find solutions for managing intellectual property rights, semantic and linguistic interoperability and the design of a meaningful user experience. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/52/wallace-et-al/ Sun, 29 Jul 2007 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/52/wallace-et-al/ At Glasgow Caledonian University (GCU) the Spoken Word [1], a project in the JISC / NSF Digital Libraries in the Classroom (DLiC) programme [2], was conceived in 2001-2002 in response to a set of pedagogical and institutional imperatives. A small group of social scientists had, since the 1990s, been promoting the idea of using 'an information technology-intensive learning environment' to recapture some of the traditional aspirations of Scottish Higher Education, in particular independent, critical and co-operative learning [3]. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/52/lovecy-rvw/ Sun, 29 Jul 2007 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/52/lovecy-rvw/ This book is, as can be seen from the extensive bibliography, a comprehensive review of the literature on change management as well as a study of how - and how not! - to apply it to the running of an information service. The basic premise, which is reiterated through the book, is that in a time of rapid technological development an information service needs to be readily adaptable, flexible, and prepared to be in constant change. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/52/russell/ Sun, 29 Jul 2007 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/52/russell/ EThOSnet is a project funded by JISC, CURL and the project partners, to bring the UK to the forefront of international e-theses provision. It is a highly practical and participative project to turn the prototype e-theses infrastructure that was developed by EThOS, into a live service that will revolutionise the document supply arrangements for theses and greatly increase the visibility of UK research. The Electronic Theses Online Service (EThOS) Project arose after several earlier initiatives in the UK had articulated an urgent need to improve on the present methods for giving researchers access to PhD and other higher-level theses. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/51/newsline/ Sun, 29 Apr 2007 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/51/newsline/ Introduction to Federated Searching Technology & DevelopmentsDate: 11 May 2007 Venue: Conference Room, Southport College, Mornington Road, Southport, PR9 0TT Delegate Fee: £50.00 This one day conference is aimed at further education library and information. As electronic content and sources of information, provided by academic libraries, become greater and vaster, the need for federated searching technologies has increased. This seminar will introduce delegates to the concepts of federated searching (also known as meta-searching) of library content, and will illustrate some of the current developments and initiatives within this field. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/51/brophy-et-al/ Sun, 29 Apr 2007 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/51/brophy-et-al/ Cultural heritage has an important role to play in today’s society. Not only does it help us to understand our past but it also has an impact on social development, the economy and education. Developments in Information and Communications Technologies (ICTs) have provided new opportunities for the manipulation of cultural heritage. Digitisation of cultural material has widened access beyond the boundaries of traditional memory institutions and has provided scope for adding value to collections. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/51/jisc-conf-rpt/ Sun, 29 Apr 2007 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/51/jisc-conf-rpt/ Opening Keynote AddressThe 2007 JISC conference began with a welcome from JISC Executive Secretary Dr Malcolm Read who thanked the more than 600 delegates for attending the conference, held for the fifth year running at the ICC in Birmingham. JISC Chairman Professor Sir Ron Cooke outlined JISC’s achievements over the last year, including the launch of the UK Access Management Federation [1], the launch of JISC Collections [2] as a mutual trading company and the launch of SuperJANET5 [3], the upgrade to the JANET network which quadruples its capacity. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/50/rinascimento-digitale-rpt/ Tue, 30 Jan 2007 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/50/rinascimento-digitale-rpt/ Hosting a conference next to Florence's Uffizi Gallery and the sculpture-studded Piazza dei Signori is not a bad place for a conference on preservation and access to digital cultural heritage. And the condition of the courtyards, palaces, frescoes around the city show that someone has done a pretty good job at old-style preservation - give or take the occasional flood. But could the same be said of the preservation of digital culture being created in the present? http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/50/newsline/ Tue, 30 Jan 2007 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/50/newsline/ Technical Advisory Service for Images (TASI) Training Programme Either: Birmingham, Bristol or London, 8 February to 27 April 2007 http://www.tasi.ac.uk/training/ The TASI programme of practical hands-on training includes three brand new workshops: Digital Photography - Level 2 Provides an introduction to the effective operation of a digital SLR, explaining how the camera's manual controls can be used to improve photography. The course also explains how to illuminate small 2D and 3D objects using tungsten studio lights. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/49/gierveld/ Mon, 30 Oct 2006 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/49/gierveld/ Institutional Repositories (IR) are a result of the vision to collect, secure, and provide access to scholarly publications in a novel, digital way, mostly initiated by the institutional library. Various factors have contributed to the emergence of these repositories, including technological innovations which allow a new form of collection management of a university's output, the desire to counteract the 'serials crisis', and the opportunity of promoting wide dissemination and quick access to publications. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/49/escience-lancaster-rpt/ Mon, 30 Oct 2006 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/49/escience-lancaster-rpt/ This workshop was held at the University of Lancaster Centre for e-Science. The organisers were Rob Crouchley, Rob Allan and Caroline Ingram, there were 17 other attendees. The main aim of this workshop was to explore the relationship between digital repositories, e-Research and Portals in the UK with a view to discovering e-infrastructure gaps and articulating requirements. The hosts had been commissioned by JISC to undertake the ITT: JISC Information Environment Portal activity - supporting the needs of e-Research [1]. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/48/c21stcuration-rpt/ Sat, 29 Jul 2006 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/48/c21stcuration-rpt/ A growing and significant part of the record and culture of the UK is now in digital form. The lives of staff working in our institutions, current students, and private individuals will be increasingly influenced by these trends and the growing demand for professionals to curate digital assets. The School of Library, Archives and Information Studies (SLAIS) at University College London aims to raise awareness of digital stewardship. Following the highly successful inaugural series of C21st Curation public lectures last year, SLAIS organised a second series of public lectures by eight leading speakers, open to students, professionals and general public during April and May 2006. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/48/jisc-cni-rpt/ Sat, 29 Jul 2006 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/48/jisc-cni-rpt/ Encapsulating the events of such an information-rich event as the JISC / CNI conference can be a tricky task, but the next few lines will, we hope, deliver a flavour of the occasion as well as a summary of a few significant themes. No single overarching theme dominated the event and indeed everyone we spoke to over the two-day event expressed a different opinion as to what they thought were the really important issues. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/48/newsline/ Sat, 29 Jul 2006 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/48/newsline/ UKeiG Training: Developing and managing e-book collectionsThe UK eInformation Group (UKeiG), in co-operation with Academic and National Library Training Co-operative (ANLTC), are pleased to present a course entitled 'Developing and managing e-book collections', to be held in Training Room 1, The Library, Dublin City University, Dublin 9 on Tuesday, 12 September 2006 from 9.30a.m. to 4.30p.m. Course OutlineThis course opens the door to a new electronic format. In the last six years, there has been an unprecedented growth in the publishing of e-books with an increasing array of different types available for all sectors. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/48/dempsey/ Sat, 29 Jul 2006 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/48/dempsey/ The catalogue [Note 1] has always been an important focus of library discussion; its construction and production are a central part of historical library practice and identity. In recent months, the future of the catalogue has become a major topic of debate, prompted by several new initiatives and by a growing sense that it has to evolve to meet user needs [1][2]. Much of the discussion is about improving the catalogue user’s experience, not an unreasonable aspiration. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/48/dunning/ Sat, 29 Jul 2006 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/48/dunning/ An article by Dan Greenstein and Jennifer Trant in an early edition (July 1996) of Ariadne introduced readers to the aims and organisation of the fledging Arts and Humanities Data Service (AHDS) [1]. Exactly ten years on from that, as the AHDS undergoes a systematic review by its funders, it seems appropriate to take stock of how the AHDS has evolved, comparing its current position with that envisaged for it when the organisation commenced work in the 1990s. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/47/burbridge/ Sat, 29 Apr 2006 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/47/burbridge/ The FP6 PrestoSpace Project [1] aims to develop systems that will permit quick, efficient and economically accessible preservation of analogue media [2]. Stream UK has built on the knowledge gained from three years of working on this project along with expertise from over seven years encoding within the industry to develop a complete encoding factory solution, based on the PrestoSpace project where the focus is on developing a semi-automated 'preservation factory' approach to preservation of audio-visual collections aimed at driving down the cost of digitising the archive below the 1€ per minute level. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/47/hiom/ Sat, 29 Apr 2006 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/47/hiom/ IntroductionThis article will describe the history of the Resource Discovery Network (RDN) [1], charting the development of subject gateways in the UK since 1993 to the present day. To help set the history of the gateways in the wider context of the resource discovery landscape in the last decade or so, readers are encouraged to refer to Lorcan Dempsey’s recent article on the development of digital libraries [2]. A timeline of the RDN’s development is also available to serve as a summary of its history. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/47/jisc-conf-rpt/ Sat, 29 Apr 2006 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/47/jisc-conf-rpt/ On 14 March 2006 we found ourselves back at the Birmingham International Convention Centre (ICC) for the 2006 JISC Conference. The annual conference [1] is both an opportunity for JISC to platform the variety of activities it funds and for delegates to learn about the full range of JISC's work by participating in seminars, debates, workshops and demonstrations. This report tries to capture the air of the event through a series of session snapshots. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/46/c21st-curation-rpt/ Wed, 08 Feb 2006 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/46/c21st-curation-rpt/ A growing and significant part of the record and culture of the UK is now in digital form. The lives of staff working in our institutions, current students, and private individuals will be increasingly influenced by these trends and the growing demand for professionals to curate digital assets. The School of Library, Archives and Information Studies (SLAIS) at University College London aims to raise awareness and interest amongst students on university vocational courses for museums, libraries and archives in digital stewardship. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/46/royan-rvw/ Wed, 08 Feb 2006 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/46/royan-rvw/ There is no shortage of guides to the delivery of e-services in learning centres, although often their emphasis is on academic rather than local authority institutions [1]. In the public library field, it could be argued that more than enough journal articles and monographs on the topic have already been churned out in the 8 years since the publication of New Library: the People's Network [2]. Is there really room on the shelves for one more? http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/46/editorial/ Wed, 08 Feb 2006 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/46/editorial/ Ten Years of PathfindingJohn MacColl reflects upon the choice of Ariadne’s name in the light of the publication’s guiding mission. The Follett Report [1] which started everything off, appeared in December 1993. When the subsequent JISC call for proposals for electronic library project activity appeared in the summer of 1994, I was only a few months into my new post as a Depute Librarian at Britain’s newest (and probably smallest) university, the University of Abertay Dundee. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/46/maccoll/ Wed, 08 Feb 2006 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/46/maccoll/ Introduction: A ‘Googly’ for Libraries?A googly, or a ‘wrong’un’, is a delivery which looks like a normal leg spinner but actually turns towards the batsmen, like an off break, rather than away from the bat. (BBC Sport Academic Web site [1]. Search result found in Google).How should we understand Google? Libraries still feel like the batsman at whom something has been bowled which looks familiar, but then turns out to be a nasty threat. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/46/lynch/ Wed, 08 Feb 2006 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/46/lynch/ This brief paper explores changing conceptions of digital libraries and how they fit into the broader information flows and information landscapes in Higher Education and beyond. It includes a few observations comparing how thinking about these questions has evolved within the very different planning, funding and implementation contexts in the United Kingdom and the United States. The central argument here is that, over the past decade in the Higher Education and research sphere, we have seen several large-scale technological shifts, with all of the accompanying organisational, social and cultural changes, proceeding largely independently - the transformations of scholarly practice, of teaching and learning, of scholarly communication, and of 'traditional' research library services. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/46/dempsey/ Wed, 08 Feb 2006 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/46/dempsey/ We have recently come through several decennial celebrations: the W3C, the Dublin Core Metadata Initiative, D-Lib Magazine, and now Ariadne. What happened clearly in the mid-nineties was the convergence of the Web with more pervasive network connectivity, and this made our sense of the network as a shared space for research and learning, work and play, a more real and apparently achievable goal. What also emerged - at least in the library and research domains - was a sense that it was also a propitious time for digital libraries to move from niche to central role as part of the information infrastructure of this new shared space. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/46/carr/ Wed, 08 Feb 2006 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/46/carr/ User-focus in the Academic LibraryIt may seem odd to say it but, even in a self-respecting part of the information world like the academic library, users have not always been at the centre of the practitioner’s professional attention. Over thirty years ago, the writer heard a long-serving Head of Reader Services (in a major university library that will remain nameless) announce, after the redecoration of his library’s main catalogue hall had completely obliterated the library’s original hand-painted directional signs, that ‘if our students are bright enough, they should still be able to find their way around the place’! http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/45/project.html Sat, 29 Oct 2005 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/45/project.html Starting the ChallengeCream of Science is ‘invented’ during a meeting of the DARE partners in the summer of 2004, while discussing different strategies to increase the volume of DARE repositories and to increase the awareness of scientists. August 2004The Cream Project starts with preparatory work done by DARE programme management. This results in a planning document that is sent to the DARE partners who quickly respond with their commentary. It becomes clear that the actual work will be delegated to the university libraries. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/45/dc-2005-rpt/ Sat, 29 Oct 2005 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/45/dc-2005-rpt/ This year's DC Conference took place over four days in the excellent facilities of the University of Carlos III in Leganes, which is a few minutes train ride south of Madrid in Spain. In excess of two hundred people attended coming from 34 countries around the world. As always it was a busy conference with many parallel strands to choose between. The rest of this report therefore covers only a fraction of all the papers and work that happened there: it is a fairly personal selection drawn from some of the sessions I attended. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/45/editorial/ Sat, 29 Oct 2005 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/45/editorial/ While as a fully paid-up cynic I could be forgiven for fingering the metaphorical revolver on sighting a technology evangelist, the evangelist in question has an excellent track record as Ariadne readers will know. Paul Miller in his article Web 2.0: Building the New Library would seem to lift our eyes above the merely technological and in a series of 'Principles' underpinning Web 2.0 provides us with a set of aims with which relatively few might argue violently - on the face of it. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/45/notay/ Sat, 29 Oct 2005 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/45/notay/ There is a great deal of evidence to suggest that people learn better when visual and sound materials are used in a teaching context. Researchers from a range of disciplines have also suggested that visual materials are of great value either as a core focus or to support the research process. For example, studies looking at the effect of visual materials in education have explored how both short-term and long-term memory is associated with the different hemispheres of the brain, but also which kind of information is best retained through the use of images. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/44/newsline/ Fri, 29 Jul 2005 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/44/newsline/ TASI Offers Workshops over Summer and Autumn Months The JISC-funded Technical Advisory Service for Images (TASI) is offering a number of workshops in the coming months, of which two below are given as examples. Building a departmental resource 11 August 2005 This workshop aims to demonstrate the steps for creating, maintaining and delivering an image collection. Through a range of hands-on activities, attendees will investigate suitable Image Management Systems (IMS), be introduced to Metadata, and consider its practical application. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/44/martinez/ Fri, 29 Jul 2005 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/44/martinez/ This article will report on existing local data support infrastructures within the UK tertiary education community. It will discuss briefly early methods and traditions of data collection within UK territories. In addition it will focus on the current UK data landscape with particular reference to specialised national data centres which provide access to large-scale government surveys, macro socio-economic data, population censuses and spatial data. It will outline examples of local data support services, their organisational role and areas of expertise in addition to the origins of the Data Information Specialist Committee UK, DISC-UK. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/44/petrie-weisen/ Fri, 29 Jul 2005 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/44/petrie-weisen/ In 2004, the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council (MLA) commissioned a Web accessibility audit from City University London. MLA is the national development agency working for and on behalf of museums, libraries and archives in England and advising government on policy and priorities for the sector. The audit was inspired by a study conducted by City University London in 2003/2004 on the accessibility of 1,000 general Web sites for the Disability Rights Commission (DRC) [1]. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/43/beagrie/ Fri, 29 Apr 2005 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/43/beagrie/ Digital information is increasingly important to our culture, knowledge base and economy. Long-term management of this material is a vital part of curation practice. This paper outlines the development and subsequent use of an international guide to digital preservation Preservation Management of Digital Materials: A Handbook [1] and its use in training and professional practice. The Handbook was published in 2001 in hard copy by The British Library and is also available digitally online via the Digital Preservation Coalition (DPC) [2]. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/43/newsline/ Fri, 29 Apr 2005 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/43/newsline/ Netskills Workshops in May 2005Web: http://www.netskills.ac.uk/ Netskills will be running the following workshops at North Herts College in Letchworth Garden City in May 2005: 10 May : e-Assessment: Tools & TechniquesFocuses on the tools available for creating e-assessment and the practical techniques required to use them effectively. The tools are considered both in terms of their functionality as well as their interoperability with other systems. 11 May: Design Solutions for e-LearningThis workshop examines how to design pedagogically effective e-learning to enhance traditional forms of teaching and learning. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/43/carpenter/ Fri, 29 Apr 2005 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/43/carpenter/ In the early days of the shift from paper-based to digital means of holding administrative records, research data, publications and other academic resources, those responsible for its safety tended to breathe a sigh of relief once they had got a category of material into digital form. Reduced to bits and bytes, all they would have to do is make regular backups, perhaps keeping a copy off-site in case of disaster, and all would be well. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/43/uksg2005-rpt/ Fri, 29 Apr 2005 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/43/uksg2005-rpt/ IntroductionDoes More Access Mean Less Library?Commercial Scholarly Publishing in the World of Open AccessWalking Away from the Big Deal: the Consequences and AchievementsAll or Nothing: Towards an Orderly Retreat from the Big DealsThe IReL Experience: Irish Research Electronic LibraryExperimenting with Open Access PublishingThe Impact of Open Access Publishing on Research LibrariesPublic Access, Open Archives: A Funder's PerspectiveVLEs: Setting the SceneThe Implementation of a VLE: Not So Virtual After AllHow Usage Statistics Can Inform National Negotiations and StrategiesThe Library View of Usage MetricsChange and Continuity in a World of InformationSnap, Crackle and Ultimately Pop? http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/42/editorial/ Sun, 30 Jan 2005 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/42/editorial/ Tomorrow, 31 January 2005 will be the moment of truth for those institutions among some 100,000 public authorities which received a request for information on the first operative day of the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) in the United Kingdom. For by tomorrow they must have responded to the request within 20 working days. No doubt many senior administrators in HE and FE institutions up and down the country will be wondering how many requests their institution has really received, as opposed to the number that have actually been reported - at least one aspect of the legislation that will not have endeared itself to them, quite understandably. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/42/newsline/ Sun, 30 Jan 2005 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/42/newsline/ Digital Cultural Content Forum 200511-13 February 2005, Oxford, UK The Digital Cultural Content Forum (DCCF) is an annual international gathering of key stakeholders in the digitisation and delivery of our global cultural assets. The focus of the meeting is to explore how public institutions that steward cultural content, the agencies responsible for public policy, and organisations in the public broadcast sectors can collaborate to deliver services to public audiences. The meeting is organised by UKOLN on behalf of the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council of the UK (MLA), the Canadian Heritage Information Network (CHIN) and the US Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS). http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/42/digi-histories-rpt/ Sun, 30 Jan 2005 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/42/digi-histories-rpt/ For the last three years the RHS has held a seminar in memory of Gerald Aylmer, the purpose of which is an exchange of ideas between historians and archivists. Digitisation was to be the subject for 2004. The AHC proposing a conference on the same subject, the two bodies came together to present this joint event. The format of the conference was that of four sessions, each with two panels, except for the last. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/42/dunning/ Sun, 30 Jan 2005 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/42/dunning/ The Web statistics tool which measures hits on the Arts and Humanities Data Service (AHDS) Web site [1] provides some telling information. The most common search engine keyword by which users discover the AHDS is not 'computers', 'humanities', 'research' or 'arts', but that old bugbear 'copyright'. Although the Arts and Humanities Data Service advises on a wide range of issues, such as data capture, metadata and funding proposals, copyright is just as popular a reason for users to arrive at the Web site. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/41/drh2004-rpt/ Fri, 29 Oct 2004 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/41/drh2004-rpt/ Project Management: Can there be a duller two words to start off any kind of article? Well, possibly 'economic costing' or 'stakeholder pensions', but project management is not far behind. But judging from presentations given at this year's Digital Resources in the Humanities Conference, it's a term with which many of those undertaking digitisation projects are going to have to become familiar. The Digital Resources in the Humanities Conference [1] is a yearly event. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/41/newsline/ Fri, 29 Oct 2004 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/41/newsline/ Hyper Clumps, Mini Clumps and National Catalogues...The JISC-funded CC-interop Project completed its work during 2004 and now is holding an event to disseminate the key findings of the project. The project built on the work of the successful eLib Phase 3 "Clumps" projects and investigated three broad areas to inform about interoperability between physical and distributed union catalogues. Find out about: how distributed and large physical union catalogues can interact, including the building of a distributed catalogue capable of accepting remote Z39. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/41/sustain-rpt/ Fri, 29 Oct 2004 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/41/sustain-rpt/ The conference on the sustainability of Big Lottery Fund projects was attended by about fifty participants from across the country and there were displays by members of the Sense of the South West Consortium, who organised the event. Approaches to SustainabilityThe first speaker was Chris Anderson, Head of Programmes at the Big Lottery Fund, successor to NOF, (New Opportunities Fund). He described the nof-digitise [1] projects, funded to the tune of £50m, as a great experiment. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/41/vanderkuil/ Fri, 29 Oct 2004 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/41/vanderkuil/ The SURF Programme Digital Academic Repositories (DARE) is a joint initiative of Dutch universities to make their academic output digitally accessible. The KB (National Library of the Netherlands), the KNAW (Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences) and the NWO (Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research) also cooperate in this unique programme. DARE is being coordinated by the SURF Foundation [1]. The programme will run from January 2003 until December 2006. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/41/web-focus/ Fri, 29 Oct 2004 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/41/web-focus/ About QA FocusThe JISC-funded QA Focus Project officially finished on 31 July 2004. The project, which started on 1 January 2002, supported JISC’s digital library programmes. QA Focus developed a quality assurance (QA) framework which could be used by projects funded by JISC’s Information Environment programmes to ensure that project deliverables were functional, widely accessible and interoperable. The quality assurance framework was supported by a wide range of briefing documents which provided brief, focussed advice on use of standards and best practices in a range of areas including selection of standards, digitisation, Web, metadata, software and service deployment. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/41/e-culture-rpt/ Fri, 29 Oct 2004 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/41/e-culture-rpt/ The eCulture symposium held for the second time in Salzburg from 27 - 28 September 2004, represents the annual gathering of leading thinkers brought together by the eCulture Group of Salzburg Research [1] to tackle specific themes in the area of research and technology development for the cultural heritage application field. This year's theme drew an audience of regional, national, and international experts from a broad selection of research institutions, multimedia companies and technology providers, as well as political decision makers, to explore the transition from digitisation to creating cultural experiences. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/40/edina-rpt/ Thu, 29 Jul 2004 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/40/edina-rpt/ EDINA [1] held its first general information event for the Higher and Further Education communities on Tuesday 11 May 2004. EDINA Exchange took place in the National E-Science Centre at the University of Edinburgh. The day began with an introduction by EDINA Director Peter Burnhill, who took us through the programme for the day, and highlighted some of EDINA's notable recent achievements. The morning session then began with presentations on the various subject and resource type clusters in which EDINA is active. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/40/erpanet-ids-rpt/ Thu, 29 Jul 2004 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/40/erpanet-ids-rpt/ Day OneIntroductionWelcome and KeynoteOverview of Persistent Identifier initiativesURNOpenURL - The Rough GuideInfo URIsThe DCMI Persistent Identifier Working GroupThe CENDI ReportARKPURLsOverview of the Handle SystemDOIDay TwoIdentifiers at the Coal FaceEPICURThe National Digital Data Archive (NDA)NBN:URN Generator and ResolverDIVAThe Publisher’s PerspectiveDigital Object Identifiers for Publishing and the e-Learning CommunitiesPublication and Citation of Scientific and Primary DataInformation and the Government of CanadaConclusion This event, organised by ERPANET [1], brought together around 40 key players with an interest in the topic of persistent identifiers in order to synthesize the current state of play, debate the issues and consider what lies on the horizon in this field of activity. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/40/newsline/ Thu, 29 Jul 2004 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/40/newsline/ Seminar Invitation from DEF - Danish Electronic Research LibraryThe DEF XML Web Services project invites you to participate in the seminar: Building Digital Libraries with XML Web Services on Friday 27 August 2004 from 9:30 to 16:00 at the Technical University of Denmark, Building 303, DK-2800 Lyngby. The headlines of the seminar are: § Setting the scene: XML - tools, visions, initiatives - Introduction to XML and Open Source Web Services http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/39/teruggi/ Thu, 29 Apr 2004 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/39/teruggi/ Memory is our major link to the past; it has greatly influenced the evolution of humankind. Since the beginning of humanity, we have sought to preserve memories through the creation of artefacts that will transcend our own lifetime and so assure ourselves some form of posterity, perhaps even eternity. For some time writing has been the major complex medium of preserved reality. Not only does writing record human actions, beliefs and emotions, but it is an intellectual tool in itself, giving a temporal perspective on our thought as well as providing increasing levels of abstraction. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/39/newsline/ Thu, 29 Apr 2004 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/39/newsline/ The Joint Technical Symposium (JTS) - 24-26 June, TorontoThe Joint Technical Symposium (JTS) is the international meeting for organisations and individuals involved in the preservation and restoration of original image and sound materials. This year, JTS is scheduled to be held in Toronto, Canada, June 24-26, 2004. Preliminary program information is now available on the JTS 2004 website. See: http://www.jts2004.org/english/program.htm For more information please see the website or contact the organization responsible for coordinating the event on behalf of the Coordinating Council of Audiovisual Archives Associations (CCAAA): http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/39/icdl2004-rpt/ Thu, 29 Apr 2004 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/39/icdl2004-rpt/ An amazing event, in an amazing placeIndia is an amazing place, and one that broadens the experience of any Western first-time visitor. I was no exception, and my personal conceptual scales for many things have been extended way beyond where they ended before. (I thought that South Londoners, Parisians and Milanese would be obvious contenders for the world championships in dangerous urban driving - until I tried the Delhi rush-hour in a 3-wheel taxi! http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/39/miller/ Thu, 29 Apr 2004 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/39/miller/ aquifer nunderground bed or layer yielding ground water for wells and springs etcNisus Thesaurus 1.0.1. All rights reserved. Using the WordNet 1.7 database, © 2001 Princeton University Google [1] is great. Personally, I use it every day, and it is undeniably extremely good at finding stuff in the largely unstructured chaos that is the public Web. However, like most tools, Google cannot do everything. Faced with a focussed request to retrieve richly structured information such as that to be found in the databases of our Memory Institutions [2], hospitals, schools, colleges or universities, Google and others among the current generation of Internet search engines struggle. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/38/public-libraries/ Fri, 30 Jan 2004 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/38/public-libraries/ Spam, privacy and the lawAnother year gone and the millennium celebrations and Y2K bug already seem to belong to some dim and distant technological past. As 2003 drew to a close the spotlight was on the use and abuse of Information Technology: never was so much havoc caused by so few. The language employed by the media to describe events in the online world reflected global concerns about warfare and disease. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/38/talis-rpt/ Fri, 30 Jan 2004 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/38/talis-rpt/ The day's programme [1] started with an introduction by Ken Chad, sales director at Talis who welcomed delegates. Public Libraries and Grids for LearningDavid Cheetham, project manager for the East Midlands Broadband Consortium (EMBC) gave a speech on the role of the broadband consortium, one of 10 regional networks in England established to deliver high-speed network connectivity to all Britain's schools. David gave a speech on the activities of EMBC [2] which was set up in the light of the government's pledge to connect all schools to broadband by 2005/06. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/37/jukes-rvw/ Thu, 30 Oct 2003 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/37/jukes-rvw/ Surprisingly, it appears to be a fact that many people involved in systems work in libraries have fallen into the position accidentally. At least, this seems to be the case in America. The author of The Accidental Systems Librarian believes that “anyone with a solid foundation in the practices and principles of librarianship and a willingness to confront changing technology can serve effectively in a library technology position” without any formal computer training. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/37/jisc-lis-2003-09-rpt/ Thu, 30 Oct 2003 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/37/jisc-lis-2003-09-rpt/ The Crime and Punishment seminar was organised by the Joint Information Systems Committee Legal Information Service (J-LIS) [1] in London, September 2003.  This event aimed to provide information about the risks, vulnerabilities and liabilities that might arise from the use of Information Communication Technologies (ICT) in Further and Higher Education. It also planned to suggest some strategies for determining the right balance between the aim of reducing risk, vulnerability and liability and the need to retain the value added to education by the free flow of information and communication. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/37/newsline/ Thu, 30 Oct 2003 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/37/newsline/ Reveal[September 2003] The Reveal Web site, launched on 16 September 2003, brings together information about services and resources for visually impaired people from organisations across the United Kingdom. Reveal is an information resource where you will be able to find books in Braille and Moon, audio books and digital talking books, tactile diagrams and other accessible format materials, find out who produces, loans or sells accessible materials, and find information about the different accessible materials. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/37/oa-forum-ws-rpt/ Thu, 30 Oct 2003 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/37/oa-forum-ws-rpt/ Welcome and IntroductionRachel Heery, UKOLN, University of BathDelegates were welcomed and reminded that this was the fourth and final in a series of workshops which have been organised by the Open Archives Forum Project. Rachel Heery explained that the project was a supporting action funded by the European Commission to bring together EU researchers and implementers working in the area of open access to archives. Fourth Open Archives Forum Technical Validation Report Birgit Matthaei, HU Berlin Technical validation based on Resource Database http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/37/public-libraries/ Thu, 30 Oct 2003 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/37/public-libraries/ Question: How many librarians does it take to change a light bulb? Answer: Er,.. Change? You can’t beat the old jokes can you, and this variation on an old theme provided some light relief to delegates on day two of this year’s annual Public Library Authorities event [1]. Who said librarians can’t take a joke? Most people managed a snigger, but then it was après lunch. This year’s event had the emotive title: Hearts and Lives. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/36/tna/ Tue, 29 Jul 2003 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/36/tna/ OriginsWilliam of Normandy, having conquered England, decided in 1086 to take account of his new territory. The result was the Domesday Book (actually more than one), which now resides in the National Archives [1]. For the BBC, the 900th anniversary in 1986 presented an opportunity to produce a television series, hosted by Michael Wood. A more unusual production was to use the combination of computer and video known as interactive video to produce a kind of modern-day equivalent of William’s survey. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/36/newsline/ Tue, 29 Jul 2003 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/36/newsline/ The British Library’s ground-breaking secure Electronic Delivery ServiceJune 2003 The British Library previewed its new and ground-breaking secure Electronic Delivery Service at the SLA 94th Annual Conference in New York in June . Fully available from October 2003, the new service means that almost anything from the Library’s huge collections - whether born digital, in print or in microform - can be securely delivered to a desktop within two hours if needed, with born digital material available for instant delivery. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/36/hunter-rvw/ Tue, 29 Jul 2003 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/36/hunter-rvw/ William Blake, Songs of Innocence and of Experience [London 1794 & 1826], Octavo Edition, 2003 - isbn 1-891788-89-2 A number of works of literature in the past were published in expensive and idiosyncratic formats, highly illustrated and occasionally coloured by hand. And sometimes the editions of these works vary substantially one from the other. Some were never in printed editions at all, but remain in manuscript. These items are difficult and enormously expensive to reproduce in print, and the cost of the process limits the size of the audience willing (or able) to pay for the reproduction edition. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/35/delos-rpt/ Tue, 29 Apr 2003 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/35/delos-rpt/ Getting there was not easy on a budget ticket - my flight was cancelled, and I was rescheduled to fly to Warsaw on a flight seven hours later. So I spent an unanticipated night in Warsaw before travelling on to Torun by train , some 150 miles further north (outside temperature around -12 deg. C, but amazingly warm inside). Torun is a small city of about 200,000 people with a surviving mediaeval core. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/35/garrod-review/ Tue, 29 Apr 2003 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/35/garrod-review/ If you want to get people to read a set of conference papers, and to engage with the topic covered - then pick a title in the form of a question. Do we want to keep our newspapers? - anyone with an interest in the media, and the power of the press in particular, will want to dip in to this slim illustrated collection to find out what it’s all about. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/34/editorial/ Wed, 15 Jan 2003 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/34/editorial/ Welcome to the December/January issue of Ariadne. This issue has as its focus the practicalities of resource sharing - not only at a technical level, but also in terms of business models. In Sharing history of science and medicine gateway metadata using OAI-PMH, David Little outlines the resource sharing arrangements between the MedHist gateway and the Humbul hub, using the OAI Protocol for Metadata Harvesting, and some of the issues it has raised. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/34/tanner/ Wed, 15 Jan 2003 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/34/tanner/ This article will describe the results of a study to investigate some of the underlying financial and policy assumptions being made in the move from previously analog photographic services into the realm of digital capture and delivery in cultural heritage institutions. The study focussed upon libraries, archives, museums and galleries with particular emphasis upon investigating how marketable, cost efficient and income-stable the new digital services and resources are in comparison with previous methods. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/34/london/ Wed, 15 Jan 2003 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/34/london/ This conference was set up 'to consider the central importance of moving images and sound to our heritage and present-day culture, the necessity of adequate funding for the archives that preserve such materials, and asks why there is a lack of any coherent infrastructure for moving image and sound archives in the UK'. In fact the real subtext of this conference was the race to save 100 years worth of material. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/34/newsline/ Wed, 15 Jan 2003 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/34/newsline/ DOCUSEND PROJECT MANAGERDocusend <http://www.docusend.ac.uk> is a national three-year project which began in May 2002 and is funded by the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC). The key project objective is to develop a journal article request and delivery broker service. The Docusend partners include the ten university libraries which comprise the Lamda electronic document delivery service <http://lamdaweb.mcc.ac.uk>, with King’s College London as the lead site. Docusend is part of the JOIN-UP project cluster <http://edina. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/34/royan/ Wed, 15 Jan 2003 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/34/royan/ There is something about the phrase “International Yearbook” that makes the reviewer’s heart sink. It conjures up an image of an arbitrary assemblage of re-cycled conference papers in indifferent English, cobbled together at random and in haste with minimal editorial control and no critical apparatus to speak of. Having some familiarity with series editor Gary Gorman’s timely and practical contributions to the literature of information services, from Qualitative Research (1997) to Information Resource Management (2001) however, this reviewer was hopeful that the annual International Yearbook of Library and Information Management (IYLIM) series might buck the trend. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/33/newsline/ Wed, 09 Oct 2002 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/33/newsline/ Following the success of the previous two Public Library Web Managers Workshops, UKOLN is proud to announce the third workshop to be held at the University of Bath in November 2002. This event offers the chance to step back, look at the bigger picture, and see how public library websites fit into the government's plans to make all services electronically available by 2005. To quote the DTLR consultation paper: e-gov@local, e-Government is about 'putting citizens and customers at the heart of everything we do' . http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/33/netlibrary/ Wed, 09 Oct 2002 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/33/netlibrary/ On January 24, 2002, OCLC Online Computer Library Center acquired netLibrary, a major electronic books (e-books) company. OCLC's acquisition includes the e-book Division of netLibrary, which OCLC has integrated as a division of OCLC, and netLibrary's MetaText eTextbook Division, which has become a for-profit subsidiary of OCLC. This article describes the rationale and background of the acquisition, the overall vision of the information environment that is being pursued, and the benefits that libraries may experience as a result. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/32/theses-dissertations/ Sun, 07 Jul 2002 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/32/theses-dissertations/ ‘ETDs’ is the acronym widely used in the US to stand for ‘Electronic Theses and Dissertations’. The father of the ETD movement, Professor Ed Fox of Virginia Polytechnic Institute (Virginia Tech), explains the acronym as containing an implicit Boolean ‘OR’: ‘ETs’ OR ‘EDs’ equals ‘ETDs’. This makes for a very convenient shorthand, whereby a digital object which is either an electronic thesis or an electronic dissertation can be referred to as ‘an ETD’. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/32/netlab-conference/ Sun, 07 Jul 2002 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/32/netlab-conference/ Every future must have a pastHow did you celebrate your tenth birthday? Perhaps by making a nice birthday cake with all your favourite ingredients to share with your friends? NetLab [1], the research and development department at Lund University Libraries [2], celebrated its tenth anniversary in April 2002 with a three-day conference in Lund, Sweden [3]. This gâteau consisted of topics on digital library development, divided into five pieces: “Semantic web and knowledge organisation”; “Interoperability and integration of heterogeneous sources”; “Visions, future issues and current development”; “The Nordic situation”; and the surprise session “Tension between visions and reality”. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/32/planet-sosig/ Sun, 07 Jul 2002 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/32/planet-sosig/ Launch of Citizenship PastThe launch of Citizenship Past took place on the 12th June. This is a NOF (New Opportunities Fund) consortium whose aim is to digitize over a half a million historical papers and images in order to open up access to archival and government papers in the following areas: Unlocking Key British Government Publications, 1801-1995: Full Text Digital Library, led by BOPCRIS, Hartley Library, University of Southampton. British Official Publications (government and parliamentary reports) constitute an immense body of material on the development of British society. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/32/public-libraries/ Sun, 07 Jul 2002 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/32/public-libraries/ I have decided to be highly topical in this edition’s Public Library column. I have chosen as my topic -finger on buzzer - the recently published Audit Commission Report: Building Better Library Services. It has, after all, caused a bit of a stir. Just when you thought it was safe to abandon the rolling stacks and had won the battle to be regarded as ‘cool’ and ‘sexy’ with all those flat screen terminals, scanners, and keen silver surfers, a brickbat is lobbed at your firewall, and, goodness gracious me, its books that are important after all! http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/32/qa-focus/ Sun, 07 Jul 2002 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/32/qa-focus/ Introduction to the QA Focus PostThe JISC QA (Quality Assurance) Focus post [1], which came into being in January 2002, was detailed in full in the last issue of Vine [5]; but for those unfamiliar with the post a brief introduction follows. The new QA Focus post is promoting a Quality Assurance framework to ensure a more rigorous approach to the establishment of consistent, high quality standards for all the JISC DNER 5⁄99 projects and their associated ‘products’. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/31/oxford-reference-collection/ Wed, 10 Apr 2002 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/31/oxford-reference-collection/ What or who is ‘Ariadne’? She was, of course, the girl who fell in love with Theseus, who gave him the thread by which he found his way out of the labyrinth after killing the Minotaur. Her story was made into an opera by Strauss in which some of the greatest operatic stars have performed. But did you know that it has also inspired other composers like Handel, Dukas, Monteverdi, Haydn, and Musgrave, and many choreographers too? http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/31/rslp/ Wed, 10 Apr 2002 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/31/rslp/ The Research Support Libraries Programme (RSLP), a £30m initiative funded by the four UK higher education funding bodies, has spawned 53 projects and a number of studies and other activities. This brief overview aims to give a flavour of the Programme. Articles relating to particular projects will appear in future issues of Ariadne. But first, some background: RSLP derives from the deliberations of the Follett Review (1993)1 and the associated Anderson Report (1996). http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/31/open-archives-forum/ Wed, 10 Apr 2002 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/31/open-archives-forum/ The Open Archives Forum: Mission and GoalsThe Open Archives Forum provides a European focus for the dissemination of information about European activities in Open Archives. A particular focus is on the Open Archives Initiative (OAI). The Open Archives Forum aims to promote the idea of globally distributed digital archives within Europe, to support the establishment of new digital archives and their related services, and to initiate European special interest groups. It is important to add particular European interests to already existing models such as the Open Archives Initiative. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/30/digilib/ Fri, 25 Jan 2002 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/30/digilib/ The notion that we are living through times of great change in the communication of information and the transmission of texts is a truism which will bring a weary look to most professionals with any kind of involvement in the area. The digital age, the information age, the electronic age – we’ve all heard these terms so many times and have sat through innumerable discussions, and seen even more documents, trying to sort out what it all means. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/30/editorial/ Fri, 25 Jan 2002 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/30/editorial/ Welcome to the December/January issue of Ariadne. A focus of this issue of Ariadne is the Open Archives Initiative and the wider implications of the techniques and technology associated with it. A major impetus behind the take-up of the OAI idea is the wish to make research available more widely and more quickly than before, and also to counter the problems created by the nature of existing academic publishing. As David Pearson writes in our lead article on digitization strategy, ‘…. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/30/pub-libs/ Fri, 25 Jan 2002 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/30/pub-libs/ My predecessor, Sarah Ormes, in her final ‘Public Libraries’ column for Ariadne, owned up to having spent five and a half years at UKOLN. Coincidentally, I too have just concluded five and a half years at the University of Plymouth. This led me to speculate, as one does in those brain numbing moments when awaiting yet another delayed train on a drafty platform in grey November (yes, its ‘leaves on the line’ season again folks), whether, after five and a half years in a post, some of us need to regenerate, like ‘Seven of Nine’, the ice maiden in the current Star Trek series -Voyager. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/29/maccoll/ Tue, 02 Oct 2001 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/29/maccoll/ This report covers a selection of the papers at the above conference, from those which I chose and was able to attend in a three-strand conference held over three days (with two additional days for workshops, which I did not attend). It includes the three keynote papers, as well as the paper which won the Vannevar Bush award for best conference paper. The conference was held in Roanoke, Virginia, in the Roanoke Hotel and Conference Center, which is owned by Virginia Tech (located in Blacksburg, some 40 miles away). http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/29/miller/ Tue, 02 Oct 2001 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/29/miller/ In July of this year, Interoperability Focus [1] organised a meeting at the Office of the e–Envoy [2], the Cabinet Office unit responsible for driving forward the UK’s e–Government initiatives. Across an increasing number of initiatives and programmes, there is a growing recognition of the need for common ‘architectures’ within which truly useful applications and services may be constructed. Partly, these architectures form a philosophical basis within which developments may be undertaken. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/29/kirriemuir/ Tue, 02 Oct 2001 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/29/kirriemuir/ This article discusses some of the issues that arise when an academic department, unit or institution moves from possessing a few digital library projects and services, to possessing an integrated digital library centre. The article is based on: the experiences of the author, who has worked in four digital library centres (according to the definition in the next section) in UK higher education.replies from various people who have been employed by digital/electronic library projects and services over the past decade, to emailed questions about various aspects of digital library centre cultureexamples of incidents or case studies of things that have occurred within UK digital library centresIt does not prescribe a 'one model fits all' plan for all budding digital library centres. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/29/newsline/ Tue, 02 Oct 2001 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/29/newsline/ JISC publishes three important documentsThe Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) promotes the innovative application and use of information systems and information technology in Higher and Further education across the UK. The JISC has published three new documents. These are the draft 3-year Collection Strategy, the Collections Development Policy and the Final Report from the JCEI (JISC Committee for Electronic Information) Charging Working Group Collection Strategy The JISC will continue to procure and make available on a subscription basis a collection of high quality electronic resources of relevance to learning, teaching, and research in higher and further education. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/29/woodhouse/ Tue, 02 Oct 2001 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/29/woodhouse/ The launch of the New Opportunities Fund’s £50 million NOF- digitise creation of learning materials (1) programme in July this year marks the beginning of a major UK-wide initiative set to create a fundamental step-change in learning support. For the past two years, a quiet revolution has been under way preparing the groundwork for a collective leap of faith into the future and the new opportunities it offers. The Government has made clear the importance it attaches to the role of learning in all its guises as the cornerstone of people’s lives. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/28/news/ Thu, 21 Jun 2001 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/28/news/ Tessa Jowell, new Culture Secretary Tessa Jowell has recently been appointed Minister for the Department of Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) replacing Chris Smith. Tessa has been a minister since Labour won its first landslide four years ago. As minister for public health, Ms Jowell was embroiled in the Bernie Ecclestone affair, when the government gave Formula One motor racing an exemption from the ban on tobacco advertising after its boss, Mr Ecclestone, gave an anonymous £1m donation to the Labour Party. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/27/johnston/ Fri, 23 Mar 2001 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/27/johnston/ After the Big Bang In her presentation to the JISC Technology Watch seminar in February, Dr Diana Oblinger of the University of North Carolina employed the metaphor of "the Big Bang" to characterise the impact of recent and ongoing rapid technological, social and economic change [1]. The last five years have witnessed major shifts in the way the commercial sector markets and delivers its products and services, and the results of those changes are only beginning to "coalesce" into recognisable patterns. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/27/meg/ Fri, 23 Mar 2001 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/27/meg/ As Pete Johnston illustrates elsewhere in this issue [1], e-Learning is big business, and likely to get bigger. Figures quoted in the recent report to the US Congress from the Web Based Education Commission [2], for example, place the current value of US-based 'formal' education at all levels at $2.5 Billion, and estimates growth to nearly $14 Billion by 2003. In the corporate sector, the figures are even more impressive, estimated at $1. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/27/pub-libs/ Fri, 23 Mar 2001 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/27/pub-libs/ After five and a half years at UKOLN I’m leaving. I’m having a small career break and will be indulging myself in some lie-ins, a bit of travel and a chance to find out just who are all those people wandering around the shops between 9 am and 5.30 pm, Monday to Friday. This then is my final Ariadne column and it’s a good opportunity to review the last five years and look forward to what the next five will bring. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/27/digital-preservation/ Fri, 23 Mar 2001 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/27/digital-preservation/ 1. Introduction Electronic resources form an increasingly large part of our cultural and intellectual heritage. In addition to electronic publications, the Web, and e-commerce, there is an array of new UK initiatives and legislation, from Modernising Government to the Freedom of Information Act, which is putting an onus on public organisations to provide access to, manage and archive their information in electronic form. In the research arena, there are also significant developments particularly in the sciences towards very large primary research data sets in electronic form e. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/27/leodis/ Fri, 23 Mar 2001 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/27/leodis/ Personal BackgroundTo begin with, as this is predominantly a libraries publication I feel an introduction to my background may be helpful in understanding this approach to digitisation. My relationship with the Leodis Database is as technical creator and manager and my background is purely technical. I studied Printing and Photographic Technology for 3 years at Kitson College Leeds and then Computer Science for 3 years at Manchester Metropolitan University followed by 1 years research in Computer Modelling at Manchester Metropilitan University, Department of Mechanical Engineering. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/26/chris/ Wed, 10 Jan 2001 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/26/chris/ Philip Hunter asked for an assessment of the achievements and legacy of the eLib Programme 5 years on. It is a strange experience trying to summarise a huge enterprise, covering more than 5 years involving hundreds of people, and costing in excess of £20M, in a couple of thousand words. I immediately abandoned any thought of comprehensiveness, any formalised evaluation, or even any serious attempt at history. Instead this is a highly personal commentary on some of the highlights for me as Programme Director of the Electronic Libraries Programme (known as eLib) with a reflection on some of the less overtly successful things – again highlights where 20:20 hindsight showed we could have done better. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/26/metadata/ Wed, 10 Jan 2001 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/26/metadata/ The Cedars conference, "Preservation 2000: an International Conference on the Preservation and Long Term Accessibility of Digital Materials," was held at the Viking Moat House Hotel in York on 7-8 December 2000. There were over 150 participants, about one half from outside the UK. As a prelude to the conference proper, a one-day workshop entitled "Information Infrastructures for Digital Preservation" was held at the same venue on the 6 December. This workshop mostly concerned preservation metadata and attracted over 70 participants. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/26/review/ Wed, 10 Jan 2001 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/26/review/ Digital Imaging: A Practical Handbook is very much a 'how to' guide for those about to embark on a digitisation project, and it offers a complete picture of the workflow process of a digital imaging project from its inception to the final maintenance and archiving of the end product. It is aimed at information professionals and librarians managing such a venture, but is also of value to researchers and students. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/26/web-watch/ Wed, 10 Jan 2001 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/26/web-watch/ This issue of Ariadne has the theme of eLib Projects. It is therefore timely for the regular WebWatch column to survey eLib project Web sites. The aim of the survey is to use a number of Web-based tools to provide information on the entry points for eLib project Web sites and the Web sites themselves. The findings may be of interest to the eLib projects themselves and users of eLib projects. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/25/subject-gateways/ Sat, 23 Sep 2000 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/25/subject-gateways/ This brief paper outlines some of the features of the policy environment which led to the setting up of the influential 'subject gateways' as part of the Electronic Libraries Programme. It has the modest and partial ambition of putting some of the discussions of the time on record. It should be read as a companion piece to two other articles. The first, Law 1994, develops the historical context for the emergence of the data centres, a central component of JISC information infrastructure, and collaterally discusses the broad thrust of JISC's developing informational activity. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/25/rydberg-cox/ Sat, 23 Sep 2000 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/25/rydberg-cox/ Digital libraries can be an extremely effective method of extending the services of a traditional library by enabling activities such as access to materials outside the physical confines of the library [1]. The true benefit of a digital library, however, comes not from the replication and enhancement of traditional library functions, but rather in the ability to make possible tasks that would not be possible outside the electronic environment, such as the hypertextual linking of related texts, full text searching of holdings, and the integration of knowledge management, data visualization, and geographic information tools with the texts in the digital library. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/24/jisc-cni/ Thu, 22 Jun 2000 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/24/jisc-cni/ The conference was opened by Professor Maxwell Irvine, Chair of the JISC (Joint Information Systems Committee), who extended a familiar transport metaphor to talk of the route maps and driving instructors needed to ensure the effective use of the information superhighway, observing that the JISC's DNER (Distributed National Electronic Resource) can be seen as the "overall integrated transport policy". He went on to highlight the international collaboration and partnerships which will be needed to bring true coherence to networked information. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/24/news/ Thu, 22 Jun 2000 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/24/news/ Foraging for a Good Read: Book Forager Goes Live It is August 2000; the UK is enjoying the driest, sunniest summer this century. You are in the library trying to find a book which isunorthodox, very realistic but also quite funny, set in Spain. You go over to the public access terminal and input details of the kind of read you need to match your mood, and the computer comes up with ten suggestions for you to try. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/22/oxford-mellon/ Tue, 21 Dec 1999 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/22/oxford-mellon/ In 1998 the University of Oxford initiated a nine-month study into its digitization activities: past, present, and future. The 'Scoping Study' as it has now become known, was funded by the Andrew W Mellon Foundation and completed its findings in July 1999. This paper briefly outlines the reasons behind the study, its methodology and how this might be applied to other institutions, the main results, and the planned next stages. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/22/dempsey/ Tue, 21 Dec 1999 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/22/dempsey/ The Information Society Technologies programme within the EU's Framework Programme Five supports access to, and preservation of, digital cultural content. This document describes some common concerns of libraries, archival institutions and museums as they work together to address the issues the Programme raises. This accounts for three major emphases in the document. First, discussion is very much about what brings these organisations together, rather than about what separates them. Second, it describes an area within which a research agenda can be identified; its purpose is not to propose a programme of work or actions, rather a framework within such a programme might be developed. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/21/at-the-event/aliss.html Wed, 22 Sep 1999 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/21/at-the-event/aliss.html The 1999 Annual Conference & AGM of ALISS (Academic Librarians in the Social Sciences) was held at the University of Wales at Bangor 30 June-1 July. The conference theme was the very current and increasingly important one of provision for non-traditional students in academic libraries. Indeed, the concept of flexibility and diversity in learning and the great variety found in today’s student population in the age of lifelong learning was highlighted at breakfast - before the conference actually started. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/21/digiwilf/ Wed, 22 Sep 1999 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/21/digiwilf/ PH How did the WWW1 JTAP seminars get started? SL A long time ago we did a set of Hypercard stacks on Isaac Rosenberg, which I converted for the web in January ‘95, and then when the JTAP call came out I thought that we could expand the tutorial and make four tutorials. And then we had all the archive nearby: we thought we would tackle the idea of creating both online tutorials and a digital archive which lecturers could use. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/21/editorial/ Wed, 22 Sep 1999 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/21/editorial/ This is the twenty first issue of Ariadne. Our first issue was published in January 1996, under the editorship of John Kirriemuir. Twenty one issues is not exactly a birthday, but nevertheless a significant milestone: I'm reasonably sure that when the idea of a web magazine was first floated in 1995, it was not imagined that it would still be around five years later. There are five main articles in this issue, each covering aspects of library networking which have to be synthesised effectively if we are to achieve the kind of seamlessly interconnected and useful electronic resources which the community is aiming at. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/21/pubmed/ Wed, 22 Sep 1999 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/21/pubmed/ In my opinion, there is no real question that completely paperless systems will emerge in science and in other fields. The only real question is “when will it happen?” We can reasonably expect, I feel, that a rather fully developed electronic information system … will exist by the year 2000, although it could conceivably come earlier. F. Wilfrid Lancaster (1978) [1] Predicting the future is very dangerous. Wilfrid Lancaster’s 21 year old comment may seem unduly optimistic when it mentions the arrival of ‘completely paperless’ systems, but the Internet and the World Wide Web would appear (almost) to be his ‘fully developed electronic information system’. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/20/editorial/ Mon, 21 Jun 1999 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/20/editorial/ Welcome to the newly redesigned Ariadne. The new interface was created to improve the appearance of Ariadne both on screen and when printed: the latter is particularly important now that Ariadne is published only in electronic format (since issue 19). The old 1996 design was generally very servicable from the point of view of structure and navigation, but it had a number of features which, with the benefit of twenty-twenty hindsight, introduced un-necessary complications to the editorial process: these have now been redesigned. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/20/metadata/ Mon, 21 Jun 1999 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/20/metadata/ The Metadata Workshop held in Luxembourg on the 12 April was the third in an ongoing series of such meetings. The first Metadata Workshop was held in December 1997 and included a tutorial on metadata provided by UKOLN, some project presentations and break-out sessions on various metadata issues [1, 2]. The second workshop, held in June 1998, concentrated more on technical and strategic issues [3]. Around 50 people attended the third workshop, mostly drawn from organisations involved in European Union funded projects supplemented by a few Commission staff. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/20/news/ Mon, 21 Jun 1999 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/20/news/ Publication of the Recordkeeping Metadata Standard for Commonweal th AgenciesThe Recordkeeping Metadata Standard for Commonwealth Agencies is now available on the National Archives of Australia Website at: URL: <http://www.naa.gov.au/govserv/techpub/rkms/intro.htm> This standard describes the metadata that the National Archives of Australia recommends should be captured in the recordkeeping systems used by Commonwealth government agencies. Compliance with the Recordkeeping Metadata Standard for Commonwealth Agencies will help agencies to identify, authenticate, describe and manage their electronic records in a systematic and consistent way to meet business, accountability and archival requirements. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/19/bobcatsss99/ Fri, 19 Mar 1999 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/19/bobcatsss99/ The 7th International BOBCATSSS Symposium on Library and Information Science was held in the modern Istropolis Congress Center in a somewhat damp and foggy Bratislava in Slovakia, 25-27 January. Although the gloom outside was lifted by the enthusiasm of the many young delegates, this year’s conference was a disappointment. In particular, the somewhat muddled 3-pronged themes of ‘Learning Society’, ‘Learning Organisation’ and ‘Lifelong Learning’ were not often addressed directly. The opening remarks stressed the importance of learning throughout life. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/18/cedars/ Sat, 19 Dec 1998 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/18/cedars/ In recent years, libraries have been fortunate to have increasing access to new and innovative digital resources. A number of factors contribute to this trend: advances in networking technology and the growth of the JANET network mean that UK libraries can deliver more information more quickly directly to their end-users; an influx of funding following on from the Follett Report has provided libraries with an opportunity to experiment with and integrate new technologies into the services they provide; the emergence of consortium purchasing (i. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/18/main/ Sat, 19 Dec 1998 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/18/main/ Hybrids and Clumps Stephen Pinfield What is a hybrid library? And clumps? What has eLib got to do with it? What are the clumps projects doing? What are the hybrid library projects doing? What will the impact be? Acknowledgements--    What is a hybrid library?A hybrid library is not just a traditional library (only containing paper-based resources) or just a virtual library (only containing electronic resources), but somewhere between the two. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/18/jstor/ Sat, 19 Dec 1998 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/18/jstor/ In August I was fortunate enough to spend a week visiting the JSTOR offices in the United States. This invaluable experience provided me with the opportunity to discuss the progress being made since the launch of the UK JSTOR Mirror Service [1] at Manchester Information Datasets and Associated Services (MIDAS) [2] and to plan future developments. History and Background If you have not heard of JSTOR before: it is an electronic journal collection of core research titles. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/18/revill/ Sat, 19 Dec 1998 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/18/revill/ Having read recent government reports, and returning now to the position of being a mere user contemplating a forty four year career in education for librarianship, libraries and (one must now add) information services, it strikes me that little has changed over the years. The problems the profession faced in the 50s and 60s are still with us. There are still many politically-charged questions that we are unable to answer convincingly, including how much it costs to provide library services for each successfully educated chemist, physicist, sociologist, geographer …… and how big the book (materials) fund should be, other than, of course, by asking “How much have you got? http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/18/tasi/ Sat, 19 Dec 1998 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/18/tasi/ The Technical Advisory Service for Images (TASI) was established by the Joint Information Systems Council (JISC) to advise and support the Higher Education community on the digital creation, storage and delivery of image based information. The objectives of TASI are to: share and promote technical expertise and standards within the academic and public sectors enable the academic community to develop digital archives of good quality image-related materials to support effective teaching and research by providing comprehensive information and advice. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/16/events/ Sat, 18 Jul 1998 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/16/events/ IntroductionA conference on Electronic Access: Archives in the New Milennium was held at the Public Record Office (PRO) [1], Kew, on 3-4 June 1998. The Conference was held as part of the UK Presidency of the European Union. Present (over the two days) were about one hundred and twenty delegates representing a large number of organisations based in the European Union, countries in east-central Europe and the Russian Federation. The conference opening speech was given by Geoff Hoon MP who is Parliamentary Secretary to the Lord Chancellor. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/16/delos/ Sat, 18 Jul 1998 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/16/delos/ Since 1996 the DELOS Working Group [1] has organised a series of workshops with the intention of promoting research into the further development of digital library technologies. Castelo dos Templários, Tomar The sixth workshop in the DELOS series was held in the Hotel dos Templários, Tomar (Portugal) on the 17th - 19th June 1998 [2]. Tomar is a small town about 140 km. north of Lisbon and is famous for its Templar castle and the magnificent Convento de Christo, an UNESCO World Heritage Site [3]. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/15/builder/ Mon, 18 May 1998 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/15/builder/ BUILDER is an eLib Hybrid Library project based at Birmingham University. It aims to develop a working model of the hybrid library to support both teaching and research through providing unified access to a wide range of printed and electronic information sources, local and remote, using a standard Web-based Intranet interface. It is known as The Birmingham University Integrated Library Development and Electronic Resource (http://builder.bham.ac.uk) and the model will be based on a series of six inter-related modules which will be developed for and applied across six subject areas. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/15/cover/ Mon, 18 May 1998 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/15/cover/ Project PATRON (Performing Arts Teaching Resources ONline) has been designed to deliver digital audio, video, music scores and dance notation across a high speed network to the desktop. The JISC eLib Programme project is based in the Library at the University of Surrey. Many of the resource materials are in the short loan section and one of the aims is to investigate ways of improving access to reserve materials, such as music CDs and dance videos, for staff and students. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/14/bobcatsss/ Thu, 19 Mar 1998 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/14/bobcatsss/ ‘Shaping the Knowledge Society’ was the theme of the 6th BOBCATSSS symposium held in the National Szechenyi Library, Budapest 26-28 January 1998. Initially, it seemed a little incongruous discussing recent developments such as Internet connections and the integration of national and local online databases in the grandiose architectural surroundings of a reconstructed magnificent royal palace. The National Szechenyi Library is thought to occupy the site of the famous Corvina Library and is housed on eight floors. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/14/view-hill/ Thu, 19 Mar 1998 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/14/view-hill/ From his present position as Director of Strategic and Operational Planning at Dawson Holdings plc Mel Collier can look back over almost 30 years spanning early work with SWALCAP, pioneering convergence at De Montfort, JISC and the Library and Information Commission among other activities. We began with the motivation behind the changes at De Montfort in the 1980’s : “It was clear that the traditional approaches simply weren’t going to be adequate. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/12/public-libraries/ Wed, 19 Nov 1997 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/12/public-libraries/ New Library: the People’s Network has had an overwhelmingly positive reception. Caveat and qualification may exist but they have been submerged in enthusiasm, gratitude even, for the vision the report presents of a renovated public library service and the specific recommendations by which it might be achieved. Its content succeeds in making its readers feel positive about the future of a strong social institution, committed to the communication and preservation of knowledge, imagination and learning in all their manifestations. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/11/bulisc97/ Thu, 18 Sep 1997 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/11/bulisc97/ The Bournemouth University Library & Information Services Conference, 1997, was organised and hosted by David Ball at the Talbot Campus between 27th and 29th August. The title of “New Tricks 2” reflected the interesting in new developments in library automation and digital resources. The theme of comparing eLib and Telematics funded projects was a very interesting and useful one with a surprising amount of synergy. The three days were organised in the familiar format of a half day for registration, introduction and conference dinner; a second day for the bulk of presentations structured in a two-tier manner with general themes for the individual sessions; and a final half day for summing up and debate. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/11/edbank/ Thu, 18 Sep 1997 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/11/edbank/ The Open University Library working with Routledge Publishers and the Open University (OU)'s School of Education and Rights Department aims to create, maintain and run a database of digitised teaching materials to support remote (off campus) students in teacher training. In order to achieve our aim Edbank [1] requires: teaching materialspermission to store electronically those sections of "text" (within these materials) that belong to third parties - rights clearancesan appropriate database and a means to make it accessible. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/11/libtech/ Thu, 18 Sep 1997 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/11/libtech/ Four eLib projects: three electronic reserve projects, ResIDe [1], ACORN [2], PATRON [3], and one on-demand project, SCOPE [4], introduced and led a discussion about the difficulties/problems facing those who wish to digitise, store and disseminate copyrighted information. Each project outlined their own specific copyright problems and approaches to solving them; giving examples of their experiences, their successes, failures and lessons learnt. They emphasised that they were unable to give anyone any clear advice on how to approach requests for copyright clearance or how to solve their own specific problems, but they were able to report what they had done, what conclusions they had drawn in the context of their own projects and experiences and give tips, for example, about identifying copyright owners, contacting them, writing letters, sending out reminders, dealing with royalties and with refusals. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/11/ppt/ Thu, 18 Sep 1997 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/11/ppt/ Parallel Publishing for Transactions (PPT){1] is a research and development project for a parallel online version of Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, an internationally-renowned journal of geographical research with a sixty-year pedigree. The project partners in PPT are the editor of Transactions, based at the Department of Geography, Queen Mary and Westfield College, University of London, and the Electronic Publishing Research Group at the Department of Computer Science, University of Nottingham. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/10/copyright/ Fri, 18 Jul 1997 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/10/copyright/ Digitisation of copyright works and other protected objects has many benefits for the user not least in terms of ease of access, however, for the rights owners it can represent both an opportunity and a threat. It allows materials to be distributed speedily on the networks, increases accessibility and opens up new markets, and yet there is also the danger of loss of sales through unauthorised use and exploitation of these same materials. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/10/ercoms/ Fri, 18 Jul 1997 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/10/ercoms/ The ERCOMS [1] project, one of eLib’s electronic short loan projects, focuses on electronic copyright management. The partners in the project are the International Institute for Electronic Library Research [2] at De Montfort University [3], the Library and GeoData Institute at Southampton University, and The Open University Library. The Project takes advantage of current Web technologies, in the form of Java programs, mod-Perl and mSQL database tools, to facilitate the development of a generic copyright management system for Web- based electronic reserves. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/10/view-hill/ Fri, 18 Jul 1997 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/10/view-hill/ The Authors’ Licencing and Collecting Society (ALCS) [1] has an international role in ensuring that UK authors are paid for the use of their works. As such, it is represented in various international groups, which means a healthy globe-trotting schedule for its recently appointed new Secretary General, Chris Zielinski. On the morning that we met in his office overlooking Oxford Street in London, he was in early, trying to catch up with mail which has accumulated during his most recent trip, to the World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) conference in Seville. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/9/acorn/ Sun, 18 May 1997 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/9/acorn/ Project ACORN (Access to Course Readings via Networks) is one of eLib’s electronic reserve projects. It is a partnership between Loughborough University, Swets & Zeitlinger B.V., and Leicester University. Acorn Launch Having gained permission to digitise 211 (66%) of the journal articles requested from 54 (60%) of the publishers approached, ACORN is now preparing to launch on April 21st. Library staff training was undertaken in the week beginning March 3rd. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/9/midrib-launch/ Sun, 18 May 1997 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/9/midrib-launch/ A picture paints a thousand words, and in the field of medicine, images are essential. The recent launch of MIDRIB (Medical Images Digitised Reference Information Bank) [1] , and the announcement of the Visible Human Dataset UK Mirror, have demonstrated JISC’s [2] determination to provide high quality content in this area for the UK higher education and research community. Medical images are extremely diverse in both their content and modality, and can range from illustrations of medical equipment, to radiological images, to 3-D objects. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/8/digitisation/ Wed, 19 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/8/digitisation/ The Australian Cooperative Digitisation Project, 1840-45 [1] (ACDP) is a collaborative project between the University of Sydney Library, the State Library of New South Wales, the National Library of Australia and Monash University Library funded through a Australian Research Council (ARC) Research Infrastructure (Facilities and Equipment) Program grant. This funding, unlike the Elib [2] projects or projects in the US sponsored under the auspices of the Commission for Preservation and Access or the National Digital Library Federation [3] is not directed to the funding of digital library initiatives. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/8/down-your-way/ Wed, 19 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/8/down-your-way/   Based in Kensington, London, the Natural History Museum [1] is housed in a building of palatial size and architecture. The museum houses one of the largest collections of naturally- occurring objects in the world, its holdings running to 68 million objects, a collection so large that less than a tenth of one percent is on display at any one time. Every conceivable type of animal, plant and mineral is represented, as well as a surprisingly large collection of books, art (one of the largest collections of art on paper in the UK), journals and other literature. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/8/oral-history/ Wed, 19 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/8/oral-history/ Like many national, regional and research libraries, the National Library of Australia (NLA) is actively facing a wide range of challenges associated with using digital technology to improve access to its collections. In at least one area this is not discretionary: the Oral History collections are intrinsically affected by technological change and without moving to digital, access to the collections will be lost as analogue audio technology loses market support. The NLA is implementing a strategy to bridge the difficult transition between fully analogue and fully digital environments. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/8/scholarly-electronic/ Wed, 19 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/8/scholarly-electronic/ The University of Sydney Library has acquired a large number of primary texts in digital form over the last few years. These texts include numerous versions of The Bible, the works of Shakespeare, Goethe and Kant, more than 700 classical Greek texts in the Thesaurus Linguae Graecae, the enormous Patrologia Latina Database of the Church Fathers, the English Poetry Full-Text Database, and the Intelex Philosophy Texts. To these texts and others like them must be added the texts available from remote sites such as the collection of some 2,000 French literary, scientific and philosophical texts at the Frantext Web site [1], and the many public domain texts available at the University of Virginia Electronic Text Centre [2] and the Oxford Text Archive [3]. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/8/survey-results/ Wed, 19 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/8/survey-results/ Here are some concise comments, both plus and minus, regarding Ariadne: What respondents like about Ariadne That on the whole it is written in English rather than technospeak (but with significant lapses). Thin. Readable - varied, some good intelligent writing - information. Up to date information. Glossy, some interesting items. Good production values. Nice format. Easy to read. Up-to-date, informed articles. A good way to keep up to date/informed about ‘key’ issues. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/8/bournemouth/ Wed, 19 Mar 1997 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/8/bournemouth/ New Tricks 2: eLib and Telematics: Projects and Partnerships BULISC ‘97 27-29 August 1997 The Conference is being supported by both eLib [1] [2] and DGXIII (Telematics Applications Programme [3] ) and will for the first time bring together projects in key areas of interest from across the EU, allowing both potential users and the project workers themselves to compare aims, objectives and results thus far. Day one …Brings you leading speakers from both organisations Day two …offers a unique opportunity to hear reports on progress from both eLib and Telematics Programmes including the four sectors of Gateways/Networked Resources; Digitisation/Images; Electronic Journals; Document Delivery. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/7/essex/ Sun, 19 Jan 1997 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/7/essex/ AbstractThis paper provides a background to the development and ongoing activities of data archives in general and The Data Archive (formerly known as the ESRC Data Archive) at the University of Essex in particular. It describes the main activities involved in running the Archive and explores the benefits for both data producers and data users of a central repository of data. It touches on the growth of The Data Archive in recent years. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/6/british-library/ Tue, 19 Nov 1996 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/6/british-library/ Further details on the call for proposals mentioned in this article can be found at: http://www.ukoln.ac.uk/papers/bl/callforproposal.html The British Library Research and Innovation Centre has initiated a process of discussion and debate among those working in the field of digital library research. This discussion is intended to help gain some idea of which issues need to be addressed and to establish how the research programmes and funding agencies in the field might set their own priorities. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/6/lindsay/ Tue, 19 Nov 1996 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/6/lindsay/ Jeremy Bentham coined the term 'panopticon' in his proposal for a circular prison, whose cells were exposed to a central well in which the warders were located, allowing the prisoners to see all other prisoners and to be observed at all times without ever knowing when they were being watched. Bentham also promoted the idea of political economy as the greatest good for the greatest number. Drawing on his terminology as the basis for this article, I therefore propose the new term 'infopolecon' to describe the political economy of information. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/6/midrib/ Tue, 19 Nov 1996 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/6/midrib/ The task of MIDRIB ('Medical Images Digitised Reference Information Bank') is to create a system for the creation, storage and networked delivery of image-related information. This involves a complex chain of events that takes an image from its raw form (such as a slide on a clinician's shelf) to the point where the user can retrieve it individually from a digital networked resource of potentially hundreds of thousands of items. In between it has to be captured in digital form and described so that it can be retrieved. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/5/dlib/ Wed, 18 Sep 1996 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/5/dlib/ Shortly, D-Lib Magazine will go to press with our fourteenth monthly issue - and it is remarkable that even after a year, we are still using the language of print to describe something that only exists on the web. D-Lib is funded by the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) on behalf of the Information Infrastructure Technology and Applications (IITA) Working Group of the High Performance Computing and Communications (HPCC) program. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/5/helix/ Wed, 18 Sep 1996 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/5/helix/ Image collections and resources are of immense importance for research, teaching and learning across a wide spectrum of subject areas. Images may be the primary research material or may inform and enrich research which is principally text based or experimental in nature. Research carried out over the last three or four years had addressed many of the problems associated with digitization, indexing and retrieval, distribution, staffing and management issues, and problems concerned with copyright and access controls. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/5/libtech/ Wed, 18 Sep 1996 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/5/libtech/ The exhibition was opened on the 4th of September by Jack Schofield, the editor of the online section of the Guardian newspaper. He gave a short speech, which included a witty section on the hassle caused by the frequent version updating of software; software where updates appeared every few weeks he named "dribbleware"! Also at the opening, the University announced the award of 462,000 pounds to the University of Hertfordshire, Cimtech Ltd and International Imaging Ltd to set up a digitisation centre that will convert more than one million pages of printed text a year into 'electronic libraries'. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/5/iielr/ Wed, 18 Sep 1996 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/5/iielr/ De Montfort University is one of the largest universities in Britain, with 29,000 students based on 10 campuses in eastern and central England. Major city locations are Leicester, Lincoln, Bedford and Milton Keynes. Given the distributed nature of the University, much use has to be made of the latest information and communication technologies: video-conferencing is used extensively in teaching, and in enabling teachers and researchers to meet and talk without leaving their own campus. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/5/surf/ Wed, 18 Sep 1996 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/5/surf/   The SURF Foundation was established in 1987 to co-ordinate the implementation of a multi-year plan for the improvement of the application of information technology (IT) in Dutch universities, schools for higher vocational education and research institutes. In the course of its activities SURF has become a nationwide supplier of services. These services are primarily provided through its operating subsidiaries: SURFnet bv and SURFdiensten bv. SURFnet manages the computer network of the same name. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/4/ilej/ Thu, 18 Jul 1996 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/4/ilej/ The Internet Library of Early Journals (ILEJ) project aims to offer expanded access over the Internet to digitised page images of substantial runs of out of copyright 18th and 19th century journals and to evaluate them in terms of use and acceptability. A part of the eLib Digitisation Programme, the project has been funded for 2 years starting on 1 January 1996. It is being run by a consortium of 4 institutions - the Bodleian Library, Oxford, the John Rylands University Library of Manchester and the University Libraries of Leeds and Birmingham. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/4/libtech/ Thu, 18 Jul 1996 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/4/libtech/ Libtech International '96 has a set of Web pages at: http://www.herts.ac.uk/Libtech/libtech.htm Libtech International is organised by the the Library & Media Services department of the University of Hertfordshire and held on the University's Hatfield Campus in September each year. The event consists of a large exhibition and a conference programme, which consists of various seminars, lectures and workshops. Entry to Libtech '96 itself is free to attend; some of the seminars and workshops charge a nominal fee for admission. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/3/libraries/ Sat, 18 May 1996 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/3/libraries/ Current public library Internet activity can be divided into four main types: Initial Experimentation and ExplorationPublic AccessCivic InformationCooperationThis is a relatively small range of topics and gives an indication of the lack of resources available to libraries with which to undertake research. Whereas the eLib programme has allowed academic libraries to explore a whole range of topics ranging from electronic documentary delivery to digitization to on demand publishing, public libraries are concentrating on much more fundamental issues. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/3/loans/ Sat, 18 May 1996 23:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/3/loans/ Short Loan Collections have long been a necessary evil in academic libraries. Sometimes called 'Reserve' or 'Heavy Demand' collections, they were developed as a compromise solution to the problem of providing sufficient copies of undergraduate texts to meet the demands of large numbers of students all requiring access to the same texts at the same time. Among the latest group of eLib projects to be funded are four in the new 'Electronic Reserve' area. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/2/copyright/ Tue, 19 Mar 1996 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/2/copyright/ The owner of a copyright has the right to prevent others from selling, hiring out or renting, copying it in any form, performing the work in public, broadcasting the work on radio or TV, or amending ("adapting") it. These acts are the so-called restricted acts. Anyone who does any of these acts without permission is deemed to have infringed the copyright and can be sued for damages. Infringement is subject to the requirement that either all the work, or at least a " http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/2/elib/ Tue, 19 Mar 1996 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/2/elib/ Recently, a wave of new projects under the umbrella of the Electronic Libraries Programme was announced. A consequence of this is that a large majority of the HE institutions in the UK are involved in at least one eLib project (is yours?), as well as many non HE organisations and institutions. Here, we give brief details of some of these new projects. In the Preprints/Grey Literature area, we have three projects: http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/1/elib/ Fri, 19 Jan 1996 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue/1/elib/ The Electronic Libraries Programme, funded by JISC as a consequence of the Follett Report into UK academic libraries, is now properly underway. The UK Higher Education funding councils have committed £15 million to the programme, which will aim to pave the way towards the fully electronic library of the future. The Electronic Libraries Programme, funded by JISC as a consequence of the Follett Report into UK academic libraries, is now properly underway.